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Robin's "HomeCare" page ( under construction ). Updated at 1100 on Saturday 7th January 2017 UK Time.

1. Money, including NHS funding under "Coughlan" and www.NHSCare.info

Utube video I set up www.NHSCare.info in 2002, after my late mother was discharged from hospital into a nursing home. Since then, many* people have claimed back the cost of the care home, which is typically £1000/week or £50,000 / year. They do this, using the Law, clarified by the Coughlan case, won in 1999 by the amazing Pam Coughlan. * a VERY small percentage of those eligable to claim contact me.

However, the same "Coughlan" Judgement is applicable to those being cared for in their own home. The costs are very much less, and - if done properly - this is what the patient and their family would prefer.

Here are some quick "guestimates", based on someone, such as my father-in-law, Jack, living independently in his own home, and receiving three visits a day. "Are you OK Jack ? Need a hand with anything ?". Some may say that I am being generous with things like salary and "business overheads" here. I welcome feedback. Suppose each of three visits takes an hour, plus 20 minutes travelling time between patients: 4 hours labour. & days / week -> 28 hours / week. Wages, if worker is paid £300 / week for a 40 hour week: £7.5/hour x 28 -> £210/week. Assuming "Business Overheads" double this: £420/week. With profit, £500 / week is half the cost of a care home. I can hear Social Workers and Care Workers shouting "I wish !" :-)

There are obviously other "capital" costs, such as mobility aids in and around the home, but depreciation on capital is small, and the sad reality is that the average patient can pass them on to someone else, after a few years of good use. white strip

2. Technology applicable to Home Care ....

John's Tesla Technology already being used includes GPS-Phone Pendant Alarms, and Web Cams, discussed below.

New developments are expected from the World of robotics. e.g. mobility aids such as SatNav for scooters, tailored to the user. More advanced robotic vehicles within the home, able to navigate using vision technology, not unlike that already found in smart cameras.

This is a massive area of Research & Development, including exploitation of smart car technology, such as John's Tesla :-) white strip

Following material is from my 2016 Christmas Newsletter , and other pages of www.GPSS.co.uk.
Yes, it will be edited down - when I have the time, or someone else does it :-)

"Starcam" web cams and "Pocket Pal" ( "Footprint" ) GPS Phone Pendent - from the AVL/Chase page....

Starcam Jack Here are two products already used to support my 97 year old father in law, Jack, who does everything for himself at home. The first is the "Starcam", purchased from China years ago, at about £30 off e-bay. The original Starcams are still used around Jack's house, work well, and can be accessed from both smartphones and software, called "IP Camera Super Client" on our Windows PC. My problem is in finding more, still supported by the PC software. Recent versions of the product look identical, but can only be accessed by smartphone, and without the extra features supported on the PC, such as motion detection, sound, and recording of pictures and video. Can anyone help me locate suitable "Starcam" product ? The "X009" below might also be a product suitable for support to the elderly. Jack avoids publicity - although this photo was among those in Golfer's World, in the article about Sunningdale Artisan's Golf Club. He spent most of the war years in Stalag Luft 8b, in the adjactent bunk to Sid De Haan, who later set up SAGA Holidays. Jack has many a tale to tell, including about the Royal Family. e.g. helping the Fergussens to move from Sunninghill to Dummer ! :-)

Pocket Pal ( Footprint ) GPS 'phone pendent The next example is "Pocket Pal", supplied by Bracknell Forest Council, and publicized on ITV shortly after rollout in February 2016. There are many companies distributing similar or identical product under different names, including "Pocket Pal", "Footprint", "MindMe", "Amigo", "Spotter", "Stray Star", and "Pebble". I wished to find reliable suppliers of this product(s), particularly regarding the firmware within the product and the web based services and sofware used to support it. The huge benifits and risks of using product from China is well known - to some of us. I have been working with the factory in Shenzhen, for purely charitable reasons. e.g. providing free advice to those exploiting these products, such as local Government and Health Authorities.

I contacted the UK supplier who sells it as "Footprint" to Bracknell Council who then call it "Pocket Pal". I was soon in contact with the factory in Shenzhen, China. Tests show that the technology works brilliantly - if used properly and supported by an adequately staffed 24/7 call centre. Early questions of Forestcare staffing, particularly "out of hours", meant that I researched support from adjacent local Government areas. Windsor and Maidenhead Borough Council led me to this useful List of Personal Locators . Pocket Pal was retained, and Forestcare have given Jack excellent support this year. e.g. a brief chat with him if he presses the SOS button by accident, or the power runs low due to poor contact with the charger. The log of all GPS movements, SOS calls, or power low events, can all be seen by the family. i.e. "looking over the shoulder" of Forestcare. The old Forestcare "Lifeline" equipment, installed years ago, was replaced by that from Surrey's Runneymede Community Alarm & Telecare Centre. Jack's Doro mobile 'phone now has the "Help" button programmed to alert family and the Surrey 24/7 Support Centre. i.e. Jack's alarm system is triplicated.

Pocket Pal 3D map Soon after contact with the Shenzhen factory, I was amazed by how quickly they fixed minor bugs in features not used by Forestcare. This was often within hours of it being raised in our friendly email exchanges. Friends and myself and my wife are now using Pocket Pals for other applications. e.g. Hands-free phones, or as GPS-loggers, recording our walks in the country, minute-by-minute, looking for a Geocache, then looking at our track in 3D using a KML file in Google Earth. The Pocket Pal may even be used in Snoopy's Robot Boat that attempts to cross the Atlantic every year. See Jasper Coppings article in the Sunday Telegraph the Sunday before the 2012 launch. This sparked publicity across the World, including UK BBC Radio and TV coverage, and Newspapers in USA and even New Zealand.

Inside a Pocket Pal ( Footprint ) GPS 'phone pendent Click on pictures to enlarge. The Pocket Pal comes with an easy to use instruction book, and the main task is to insert a SIM card. For many years, whatever the tracker, this was a simple task, by temporarily putting the SIM card into a simple mobile 'phone - like my old Nokia here. Top up can be a bit more fiddly on some networks, since they are not now organised for where the SIM card is in a tracker. However, most pay-as-you-go services are fine, and you should not need to do it very often, based on my experience with my first Pocket Pal: running 24/7 for several months, updating the web site map every 3 minutes - or in recent weeks, every one minute.

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From the 2016 Christmas Newsletter page ....

Jack and Robin at Bray Lake June's dad Jack is now 97 and remains fiercely independent at home. Jack does not employ servants for anything, including gardening, housework, cooking, and laundery. He takes a taxi to the doctor, but we give him a lift each Saturday, when we all do our "Tesco Big Shops" together. Jack gets through the checkout before June, so we have time to chat up the young girls in their seventies. Robin sees Jack most days, and we take trips out, while June works at Axon. Here we are catching a bit of sunshine at Bray Lake, where Robin tests Snoopy's robot boats. Jack is an old soldier, and survived nine falls this year that required an ambulance call out. Five meant time in Frimley Park Military Hospital. Sometimes Jack is kept in for weeks before considered safe to be allowed home. Robin has now done work making Jack's home a bit safer. e.g. the new Hubble Webcams, phones, back doorstep, and alarm systems, including the Pocket Pal, from Robin's friends in China. Robin now has some some peace of mind, after sharing documentation, including work yet to be done, with trusted friends, extended family, and experts within the NHS and industry.

Pocket Pal There is sometimes overlap between technology, health, hobbies, and charity. Robin wears his own Pocket Pal, hands-free GPS-Phone everywhere. It records our walks such as when geocaching . June has one in her handbag, and Robin has been known to give demonstrations to friends: phoning June in the shops: "Help! Help! I'm a little mouse trapped in a handbag !".

Robin's new Bigger Picture page says where we spend our time ... not just with work, hobbies, and journalists.

Robin still handles www.NHSCare.info to help families use the Law to make the NHS pay for the Care Home. Almost all who contact Robin get the NHS to pay what is typically £50,000 per year. Most are motivated by anger, and there is a small group who are "well connected", for if and when publicity is used again. There is a link to Robin's 2015 "Bluebell" pages, and a February 2016 footnote was added after the BBC Season on mental health. However, unlike making the NHS pay for long term care, publicity will not fix these UK NHS problems: we need to help patients overcome the root cause of their mental health problem. e.g. alcohol or drug addiction.

Grumpy Christmas NHSCare.info

Michael, Becky and Sally - Robin's sister. We all dropped in on them in September. Gary and Saskia seem worried that their dog Prince will steal the cake after the drink !

Michael, Becky and Sally Campion

Robin and his friend Eric Wardle have put more of Eric's videos onto Eric's page. Eric's little one metre boat, with Snoopy's Autopilot, smashed the Bray Lake Test record !

Robin and Erics robot boats white

white strip Saving Private Ryan Jack has been in Frimley Park Military Hospital for over two weeks, and I was sure they would kick him out before Christmas. I spoke to the Physio on the 23rd, and it just needed a doctor's signature for me to take Jack home. However, it being Christmas, it may be the familiar "maybe tomorrow" story that is given to patients. We would not want a repeat of what happened in 1945, when Jack and his mates got back from Stalag 8b in tha POW exchange, only to find themselves waiting on the south coast to pop across to Normandy. Jack was with the paramedics, and always told me Saving Private Ryan was the only realistic war film. There's a lot more about Jack's WWI experiences on my Bigger Picture page. e.g. Dunkirk, then Stalag Luft 8b, in the adjacent bunk to Sid de Haan, who set up SAGA Holidays. On the general problems within the NHS, I'm sure there are experienced Frimley Park staff, of all ranks, who can give me advice. Jack can enjoy the good food and chat up the nurses :-)

Frimley Park Military Hospital

Frimley Park Hospital was good enough for the local Royal Family, and perhaps the best in the country. Best Wishes to Fran and her work mates ! :-) white strip

Robin's Aunty Ruby Robin's Aunty Ruby Robin's Aunty Ruby Bernie Sharp Robin's Aunty Ruby and Uncle Bernie live in College Road, just around the corner from the entrance to Sandhurst Military Academy. Robin sometimes pops in, to tell them what mischief he has been up to. Ruby had a stroke 17 years ago, and Bernie, 85, is her carer. His back has been playing up lately, which makes it a bit more difficult for his walks to the betting shop and caring for Ruby. She obviously qualifies for NHS Continueing Care, and it would be a nice Christmas present for Robin if he had reason to believe it would be granted quickly. Bernie's brother Ern, served with the Desert Rats during WWII, coming up through Africa through Sicily. That Bigger Picture page also tells of Bernie's dad, my Grandad Sharp, in WWI. Jack was asleep when I visited this Christmas Eve, so I popped into Bernie for a chat. Bernie said he was thinking of writing a book about his dad, Harold Sharp. We set up my Mobius camera, and recorded the three of us chatting about family history. Click on Bernie to enlarge, reads his newspaper, and see a draft printout of this page. There was a lot of banter. e.g. it seems the reason Ruby latched onto Bernie was that he was the only guy with a motor bike and sidecar. He'd sold it to my dad, Len Lovelock, to replace that Brough Superior. I told Bernie that I was planning to get one for June, so we could look as grand as George and Mildred :-)

Christmas Eve: When June visited Jack in the afternoon, a doctor came in and told Jack, "You can go home tomorrow morning". I'll pick up Jack in the morning and take him to his home. He can check the triplicated alarm systems, web cams, and additional mobility aids. He can join us for Christmas Lunch at Saskia and Gary's in Bracknell if he wants.

white strip Christmas Day with Jack Christmas Day with Jack Christmas Day Risk Christmas Day Risk white strip

Christmas Day was perfect: a good news 'phone call from Scott in Sunderland; dropped the Christmas Eve video into Ruby and Bernie's; collected Jack from Frimley Park Hospital and we went direct to Saskia and Garry's for Christmas Lunch. Gary's boys, Jack and Harry, joined us in the afternoon, and Jack watched his inherited great grand children open their presents. In the journey with Gary to Maidenhead, to collect the boys from their mum, Robin was amazed to hear that Gary had gone to Aberwystwyth University, hub of the Microtransat robot boat activity, and had learnt German. Robin was even more amazed when they wanted to play RISK. The last time June and Robin had played that game was with Jon and Coleen in Holland, from 1971 ! Harry said he would play Prince Harry, representing the Brits. He insisted that his dad played Donald Trump, for the Americans. Robin did not need much encouragment to play Dr Strangelove for the Germans, with a fake German accent for the Mobius camera. All this is recorded on video, and I will say that the game ended with Germany completely intact, and the USA completely occupied by the Brits. For more background, visit the Snoopy page. The classification of our Mobious video is Cosmic Top Secret. We may need to redact some of the material :-) Tower of London red poppy

Boxing Day & St Stephen's Day : time to update our Christmas video below ? See 2014 Christmas Letter ? June: any video clips you took here, and your favourites this year ?

Xmas 29 Dec 2016

Active Away Thursday 29th December: Lots of good news: Yesterday our extended family worked as a team. e.g. the visit to King's Corner Surgury in Sunninghill. We saw the brilliant result this morning: arrival of that lovely Social Services (SS) Emergency Care nurse at 0749, with Jack up, dressed, sat in his chair, and eating within 15 minutes. I was impressed by use of written notes on paper: not just relying on a vulnerable smartphone. The "administration" took over 45 minutes: how about written notes plus a cheap voice recorder ? Nice if they wrote anything important for the family in Jack's Desk Diary. e.g. a little triangular table to his right ? Anything to use their skills efficiently. e.g. chatting to the patient rather than inefficient record keeping. I'd love to have a visit here from the person at Forestcare, who knows about their technology, such as Pocket Pal. I'm happy to provide some free advice. e.g. Pocket Pal updates and appropriate use of webcams.

Pocket Pal I was delighted to find an old VHS tape, which is a treasure-trove of relevant memories, including of Trevor. Dramatic clips will go into our Christmas video below. Our house guests left yesterday, with amusing video of their time with us, yet to be looked at. I also chuckled at the arrival of the letter from DHL to me, saying they were starting legal proceedings against me. Snoopy's mug above does not relate to the NHS: we've been there and done that years ago - as we have with others, including UK Government organisations, such as Ordnance Survey and Tax Authorities. I like to protect myself from their computer glitches. This DHL transaction was for the extra Pocket Pals that I got direct from dear Yilia in Shenzhen, for hobby and charity purposes. I always say "no hurry", but when I email my order, someone arranges that I receive the parcel the very next day. After Christmas, my friends and I hope to spend more time on fun projects. e.g. putting Pocket Pals into little Robot Boats and GPS Bottles, to sail back and forth across the Thames near Eton Bridge, or maybe down the Thames to London. We can chat with any passing river traffic. I'll continue with adding video clips below, as a backround activity, when there is nothing else to do. We will dig out pictures and video clips where we can. e.g. Matt and Steve, from our Active Away tennis holidays, won last night's "The Apprentice".

Vegi Nick Knowles Monica Lilley Michelle on train Click on the pictures to enlarge. That's Michelle, off on the train yesterday, from Ascot back to Coventry. She is veggy, as is her sister Saskia, so they may be interested in Monica Lilley, who gave me a vegan leaflet. June wanted another trip to Guildford, to buy presents. We used the opportunity to visit Oak Furniture Land , followed by Furniture Village . We were interrupted by a 'phone call from June's sister Gill, and came straight home and on to Jack's. In short: Maidenhead SS visit today, in morning, lunchtime and evening. Jack said nice Scots Jackie. Jack said he had a visit from the Maidenhead SS Coordinator who said Bracknell Forest SS would take over from tomorrow. Better because closer and Pocket Pal. She also had Jack walk up and down the stairs (halfway was enough), and said the two wheel walker was more suitable. She left the three wheel one ( June got for £50 off Amazon ) in view near the back door, so Forestcare could choose. We returned home to find "The Windsor" magazine had been posted through our letterbox. There was Nick Knowles staring up at us :-) white strip

Saturday 31st December 2016, New Year's Eve: Good to see all is good over at Jack's. That was a nice touch of the SS ( or Gill ? ) to drape that tartan blanket around Jack's walker. Today, June wants to do some more shopping for (late) Christmas presents, and I'll amuse myself digging out old and new video to update that "Part 2" below. No time to edit it properly, but in 2017, bits may be of use to some of my friends, including particular journalists. We have no plans yet for tonight. If Jack doesn't want to see the New Year in, watching BBC TV, maybe we can do it over at Bernie and Ruby's. June can drive back ;-)

Jack's Hubble camera on New Year's Eve 2016

Michael Campion Ruby Sharp Monday 2nd January: What a lovely way to wrap up our 2016 Lovelock Family Newsletter. Who knows what lays ahead for us ? But, so far, so good. June and I were unable to see today's Sunninghill Wheelbarrow Race because we would be on our way to see my sister Sally Campion, Michael, Becky, and Prince. My extra presents for them were two Pocket Pals: one for Michael, and one for Sally - although it seems they have ideas of that being attached to Prince. I inflicted some of that family news video on them, and got told where to stick it. Michael told me a yarn or two from past career. He spend years as a care worker, in the Slough Area, working for the same Maidenhead SS as now caring for Jack. This job had been life-changing for him, in defeating his addiction to booze. One lovely anacdote involved a senior nurse and a dear MS patient. Before that he spent years as a car mechanic, and before that, as an engineer at Heathrow, maintaining aircraft. I look forward to a trip to Strauns again soon, to record old memories, and to discuss his ideas for a three wheel motor bike / mobility scooter, that overlaps with mine. Exploiting Tesla or Google smart car technology, into the mobility scooter market. My "Last of the Summer Wine" team have already been discussing this: John Silvester has a Tesla. These ideas, along with things like Pocket Pals and Cameras, will go onto a new "HomeCare" page in 2017. I look forward to another long chat with Bernie and Ruby, including about Harold Sharp, my dad Len Lovelock, and my "Uncle" Tony Pollard. Every day I learn something new, including about myself, and my genetic history :-) white strip

white strip Dr Strangelove Cockleshell Heroes Extract from the Home page of www.GPSS.co.uk: I entered Defence Industry as an apprentice in the mid 1960s. Ferranti sent me to University for a B.Sc in Electrical & Electronic Engineering. That's where I saw Dr Strangelove. I became a Systems Engineer, and work included Royal Navy ship software. I worked for SHAPE as a NATO scientist through the 1970s, when GPS and the Internet were secret. Our young family returned to the UK in 1981 and I worked for EASAMS at Frimley until starting our small GPS Software business in 1994 - now a hobby. In publicity about Snoopy's Robot Boat, the Press called me a "Retired NATO Scientist". Perhaps that should have been "Mad Retired NATO Scientist" :-)

See Dr Strangelove - the Wiki article and videos. Peter Sellers starred as the mad ex-nazi scientist. See "Robin's German Connections" on our Bigger Picture page.

Dr Strangelove in Sunninghill :-)

© 1970-2017 Robin Lovelock. www.GPSS.co.uk

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