Monthly Archives: May 2012

Devoted wife fears she could lose lifeline

May 22, 2012   Cancer, Carers, dementia, ukcuts

COMMITMENT … loyal wife Betty Greenwell is determined to take care of ailing husband Wilf.

By PAUL KELLY
Published on Tuesday 22 May 2012 17:30

A LOYAL wife of a dementia sufferer with cancer has told of her fears over a vital support service they could lose.

The Home Support Service provides a lifeline for Betty Greenwell, 75, of Lilburn Close, East Boldon.

Betty is a devoted carer at home for her dementia-stricken husband Wilf, 86.

The couple were both widowed when they married 13 years ago and made a pledge to care for each other ‘in sickness and in health’.

It’s a commitment loving Betty is determined to see through as her husband also battles bowel cancer.

But she is angry that the future of the support service, funded jointly by South Tyneside Council and the borough’s Primary Care Trust (PCT), is uncertain.

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Time to wipe away the whining about paid carers

May 22, 2012   Carers, Older care

The quality and quantity of care that’s on offer for older people was unimaginable a couple of generations ago

 

We need to connect the arm’s-length overclass with the hands-on reality of being a carer, says Stewart Dakers.

Doris, myself and Charlie are in the cafe across from the bus stop discussing the latest care home scandal involving the abuse of residents by carers. The newspapers are full of recriminations, interviews with ministers, Age UK and emoting relatives. It will not be long before I am “in care”, and so I have an interest in such incidents.

It has often appeared to me that there is an unpleasant taste of self-righteousness among the prosecution, and that they are out of touch with the realities of the care situation. Charlie, as usual, does not mess about: “They’re all bloody foreigners, them nurses. Don’t understand our ways.”

He’s spot on, though not in the way he means. The care staff don’t understand our ways, because most of them come from cultures that view the dislocation of elderly people from their families as barbaric.

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Action on Stroke Month

May 22, 2012   Carers, stroke

This month saw the launch of the UK’s first Action on Stroke Month, an annual event organised by the Stroke Association and supported by the Wellcome Trust

 

The two different types of stroke –

Earlier this month, the Stroke Association launched the U.K.’s first Action on Stroke Month, an annual campaign that aims “to increase awareness of the impact of stroke and reach out to many more stroke survivors, their families and carers.”

The campaign is supported by the Wellcome Trust, which has put together a package of materials that are being published throughout the month.

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