The damage alcohol can do to the body

0
Wpid Beverley Pickorer
The Damage Alcohol Can Do To The Body

Beverley Pickorer

Beverley Pickorer, 35, with her partner, Anthony Howard, 31

These shocking images show the damage alcohol can do to the body ? even at a young age.

Mother-of-four Beverley Pickorer faces certain death from liver disease as a result of years of heavy drinking.

The 35-year-old is plagued by epileptic seizures, her teeth are rotting, her stomach is swollen and her skin is thin and jaundiced.

Now, her distraught partner Anthony Howard, 31, is pleading for her to be allowed to return to her home in Sheffield to die.

If his wishes are not granted, she will spend her last days being nursed around the clock at Haythorne Place Care Home, in Shiregreen.

Ms Pickorer has been drink-dependent for years and at her worst was downing up to 24 cans of lager plus a bottle of perry ? pear cider ? in the morning, then visiting the pub, then drinking as many as 16 cans when she returned home.

Her four children have all been taken into care.

She has spent the last eight months receiving palliative care in the home, where most other residents are elderly. Before that, she spent four months in hospital.

?I?ve been looking after my partner for five-and-a-half years, and she?s constantly been in and out of hospital with liver cirrhosis,? said Mr Howard.

?She?s the youngest person in this care home. All she can do every day now is stay in bed. The staff come and turn her over every two hours.?

Mr Howard said Ms Pickorer?s drinking problems started in her early 20s, during a series of troubled relationships. 

?When I met her I took her drinking as part of her, it?s something I got used to,? he said.

?When she got up and had a can in her hand straight away, I got immune to it. To her it was like having a cup of tea.

?Beverley has four beautiful children, they are now aged six to 15, and they have all been taken into care because she can?t look after them.

?It?s tragic. We made an agreement that when she dies she would die in my arms at home, but the NHS has said it would be too expensive to care for her at home.

?They would have to pay for one carer and a nurse. She?s on a syringe driver to stop her having seizures. But Beverley wants to die at home and I don?t think you can deny a person that.?

Matt McMullen, from the Sheffield Alcohol Support Service, said Beverley?s situation is ?very sad?.

?Unfortunately it is not unheard of for someone of such a young age to be experiencing such severe health problems as a result of alcohol consumption,? said Mr McMullen, the service?s activities co-ordinator.

Kevin Clifford, chief nurse for NHS Sheffield Clinical Commissioning Group, said he was unable to comment on individual patients.

?Whenever possible, the CCG looks to arrange care which meets the wishes of patients and their carers, as well as their care needs. However, in so doing, we have to consider the safest and most appropriate manner in which an individual?s needs can be met. 

?It is always regrettable when we have to take a decision based on a patient?s safety which doesn?t meet the hopes of their family. 

?But we work with the family to offer them a range of solutions, and endeavour to offer a care package that is in the best interests of the patient and agreeable to the family.?

According to NHS figures, between 2001 and 2009 there were 400 deaths per year in people aged up to 39 where alcoholic liver disease was the underlying cause.

Dailymail.co.uk

Send your news stories to [email protected] Follow News Ghana on Google News

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here