“I DID a gig at a nursing home. Tough crowd. They wouldn’t respond to my knock-knock jokes until I showed my ID.”

That’s a Frank Skinner line that you know older people will find funny. When you get older you don’t lose your sense of humour. But, too often, there isn't much to make you laugh about ageing.

When you’ve a few years on your clock even laughing can lead to your bladder lodging a complaint.

Over the past decade I’ve spent a lot of time with elderly people in hospitals and care homes across the country and take my hat off to the patience and care shown to patients and residents by staff. Make no mistake, looking after others isn’t an easy job and I’ve witnessed many displays of kindness, often on a daily basis, that deserve medals.

But yesterday a damning report by the health service ombudsman Ann Abraham exposed how the NHS nationally was failing elderly people.

And, in many ways, she is right. I have also seen older people struggle to keep their dignity when hard-pressed staff are unable to drop everything to help.

Take one example. If you or I need to go to the loo, we get up and find one. If you’re elderly and have lost your mobility, you can't. You have to wait for someone to help you.

And if, for sound reasons, staff are pre-occupied with others’ needs, you have to sit and wait. And worry. And maybe suffer indignity and distress.

I don’t want to have to face that when I am too old to look after myself.

If your need is urgent it should be addressed right away. There isn’t time to wait.

And that applies to the NHS in the way it meets the needs of people who have simply grown old.