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Health Professional - Assessment

ShaVerZ

Evening! I recently had a face-to-face assessment with a health professional, in my home.

I'm a little concerned because I believe that the person who assessed me, is not a health professional! She had no idea what my medicines are and what they are used for, medicines which I believe, she should know. She had no idea what an auto-immune disease was? I understand that she may not have heard of one of the diseases I suffer from as it is very rare but she should know what a biological drug and others are, surely?

Perhaps she was playing dumb but it certainly did not seem like that, what does a health professional really mean?

Many thanks in advance.....

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Comments

wilko

Hello and welcome, a health professional who take pip or Esa assessments is not trying to diagnose your conditions disability but establish how your conditions affect your abilities to cope manage the descriptors in relation to the definition layer down in the assessment procedure and to make sure the information you submitted in your application form is correct and you can or can’t do the things you wrote in the application form.when I was diagnosed with MS my GP admitted he did not know a lot about the subject.

poppy123456

HI,

Completely agree with @wilko here, it's the claimant responsibility to give as much information about how their conditions affect them as possible. PIP isn't awarded based on a diagnosis, it's how those conditions affect you and everyone is affected differently by these conditions.

DuffersMum

The HP who did my assessment was generally clueless about everything and I think was possibly deaf as well as she wrote things in her report that I didn’t even say, absolutely useless, I have little faith in any of them....

ShaVerZ

I very much doubt they are health professionals, I wonder what qualifications they have.....? Probably none, just completed a 2 day course with no academic qualification!

cristobal

@ShaVerZ - I believe that most of the assessors are nurses, paramedics, and physiotherapists.

They have to have a current professional registration - if you know the name of the assessor (if you can't remember it will be on the report if you ask for it) you can check on-line.

pollyanna1052

Just being inquisitive about who can perform these assessments, I looked on the DWP website and saw vacancies for such jobs. They do have to be a qualified HP...it`s well paid too!

ShaVerZ

I just got my decision, 0 points! She must have been deaf, perhaps we had the same HP @DuffersMum

My son, who cares for me cant stop laughing...... what a lash up!

DuffersMum

A nurse knows little about how arthritis affects you....my assessor was a nurse who didn’t seem to know the difference between a knee and a hip ??‍♀️

A friend of mine who is a nurse did the job for a while, couldn’t stand having to lie (her words, not mine), her son (ex paramedic) also did the job for a while and also couldn’t cope with having to twist people’s words to ensure they don’t meet the descriptors....both left...

ShaVerZ

If that is true, something isn't right. It also seems like the assessor has lied but I'm finding it difficult to understand why they would lie. Theres alot which seems to be incorrect, either that or the person processing the claim has done everything possible to make the application unsuccessful.

I want to point out that I've never expected the assessor to diagnose my health conditions, so I dont know why that was suggested at the top of the comments because i didnt say that!

Seems odd that my ESA claim was moved from WRAG to Support Group based on my needs but the PIP gets a total of zero. I understand that these are two different benefits but the esa claim would suggest I'd get at least some points.....

Ah well, we live and learn.

poppy123456

It's the claimants responsibility to explain everything about how their conditions affect them. There's very little time during an assessment to go through everything, if you don't do this. PIP isn't about a diagnosis and a HCP doesn't need to know everything about all conditions because everyone is affect differently.

ESA and PIP are 2 completely different benefits and moving from the WRAG to the Support Group will have no affect on a PIP claim because the criteria is completely different.

ShaVerZ

Who said I didnt do this?

poppy123456

ShaVerZ said:

Who said I didnt do this?

I'm just advising you on the way it should be done. You'll be very surprised the people that will fill out a form with very little information.

DuffersMum

poppy123456 said:

It's the claimants responsibility to explain everything about how their conditions affect them. There's very little time during an assessment to go through everything, if you don't do this. PIP isn't about a diagnosis and a HCP doesn't need to know everything about all conditions because everyone is affect differently.

ESA and PIP are 2 completely different benefits and moving from the WRAG to the Support Group will have no affect on a PIP claim because the criteria is completely different.

I explained everything, very carefully..yet my hip replacement might continue to improve...no hip replacement here, just 2 knee replacements ??‍♀️ I go to the post office a lot apparently..been once in 12 months and definitely did not mention the post office....my range of movement is identical in both legs....whereas in reality my right hip is far worse than my left one and my left knee far worse than my right one..

a copy and paste from another report or template I suspect on the last point...the rest just went to show she wasn’t listening to anything I said so made it up instead....

when I go for reassessment I will be requesting that I am not seen by the same assessor, i am also in the process of sending in a complaint about her to ATOS...sorry IAS as they like to be known now due to poor ethics in the past which it seems are still common place today.

ShaVerZ

Is there an incentive for them to do this? I was told that they are there to support me and to ensure I've put everything down on my claim form. A chance for me to explain my illnesses and how it effects me. Some of the information given in my letter goes on about me attending a comprehensive school and that I should be able to read! I dont have difficulty reading, I have difficulty focusing as I suffer from Serotonin Syndrome due to my medicines! What that has to do with me attending secondary school 32 years ago confuses me!

Perhaps they just dont like disabled/sick people!

Thanks for your input though, it seems like this is more common than I thought.

cristobal

@ShaVerZ - I believe that the assessment is to check/ verify the information that you have provided when you applied, and to enable the assessor to have all of the information needed to decide which 'descriptor' applies (i.e. how many points you score)

Also to confirm that what you say is consistent.

For example if you say that you are unable to chop vegetables because you can't grip a peeler properly then you probably wouldn't be able to brush your teeth or do up your shoelaces.

Similarly if you can't sit down for anything other than a short time whilst you get dressed etc you probably wouldn't be able to drive a car..

Hope this helps...

poppy123456

They are definitely not there to support you. They are there to assess how your conditions affect you against the PIP descriptors.

Lots of people successfully claim PIP without any problems at all but we rarely hear their stories. Naturally those that have been refused will tell their story because they are looking for help and advice going forward.

If you're unhappy with a decision the MR is the first step followed by Tribunal if the MR fails. My advice is not to mention any lies or contradictions that may have been told in the report because DWP and the Tribunal won't appreciate you mentioning any of those, infact for Tribunal purposes it could potentially harm a case. All they are interested in is where any why you think you should have scored those points, with added real life examples.

ShaVerZ

So it is best to follow procedure and then make a complaint later? I'm not happy that this person has lied and I'm not prepared to forget this! It is important because if she has lied about me, she most certainly will be doing it about others.

poppy123456

ShaVerZ said:

So it is best to follow procedure and then make a complaint later? I'm not happy that this person has lied and I'm not prepared to forget this! It is important because if she has lied about me, she most certainly will be doing it about others.

My advice is to do as i advised, once the MR request is written and sent then make the complaint. I can't promise that anything will be done but the more that complain the better, maybe something will be done in the future.

DuffersMum

I have actually complained to the Disabilities Minister and the Minister for Work and Pensions, awaiting a response once the election is over...I did write before to the Disabilities Minister who advised it had to be sent to the MInister’s inbox at DWP, which I did, all I got was a phone call from a customer services person who said they’d add it to my file..not acceptable so I’ve told them so and asked them to investigate properly this time!

poppy123456

DuffersMum said:

I have actually complained to the Disabilities Minister and the Minister for Work and Pensions, awaiting a response once the election is over...I did write before to the Disabilities Minister who advised it had to be sent to the MInister’s inbox at DWP, which I did, all I got was a phone call from a customer services person who said they’d add it to my file..not acceptable so I’ve told them so and asked them to investigate properly this time!

The assessment reports have nothing to do with DWP at all so it's very unlikely that you'll receive a response from that complaint. Any complaints regarding the report should only be sent to the health assessment providers.