PIP Disability Allowance. Dependant on the time you are awarded your PIP for, after a few years you will have to have another assessment even if you have a life long disability or illness that will not improve. If you have a terminal illness you are exempt which is exactly what should be the same for people with illnesses that will not improve. In 2018 it was published that people with long-life illnesses would be assessed every 10 years, but to date no guidance appears to make sense as to how you can prove this and be accepted for it, also what is to say after 10 years this may change again and go back to more frequent assessments. Also, the people who decide how long till a review in many cases do not understand the complexity of conditions that aren’t in the public eye, like Cavernoma’s and so rule on the decision without having any kind of medical background with what these conditions entail. I am petitioning for these assessments to stop indefinitely until a consultant/GP advises otherwise.

My mum has a Cavernous Angioma (Cavernoma) which bled 10 years ago causing her to be hospitalised for several months and loose her ability to walk, talk and swallow. In this time through complications she also ended up in intensive care with pneumonia and had to have a life saving tracheotomy put in for several months as well as a feeding tube. She had physio therapy for 6 months and was able to develop to as well as she can be her new normal. This includes not being able to go out without someone by her side and struggling to do day to day things. The symptoms that she will experience for the rest of her life are similar to those  a stroke victim suffers, due to the severity of the bleed, she will not ever get any better than she is now. Her balance is impaired and so she can not get a job or live the normal life a 50 year old can. It upsets me that every 4 years for her she has to have a PIP assessment proving that she is still disabled when even her neurologist has confirmed she will never get any better than she is now. These assessments are horrible to make someone who won’t get any better prove she’s still as disabled as last time she got awarded the PIP. As a family we do not claim any benefits, nor does my mum claim any benefit for not working and so the PIP was something we chose as a family for my mum to apply for as it was done on nothing other than what her disability allows. I wish for no family to have to go through these excruciating assessments if it has been proven by a health professional that their condition will not improve from their original PIP assessment date. 

Please support this petition and try and make a change, so people with lifelong illnesses and disabilities who already have it hard enough, do not need to feel belittled or any different to anyone else.