Category Archives: Carers

Empowering community nurses to support family carers in the community

June 23, 2014   Cancer, Carers

“Small changes can be enormously meaningful to the life of a carer,” said Ben Bowers, Queen’s Nursing Community Cancer Nurse Specialist.

With the support of The Queen’s Nursing Institute, the RCN District Nursing Forum hosted this event to update delegates about best practice, and the tools available to enable community nurses to support carers more effectively. This includes the Carers Project – the foundation of which is a free online resource with seven modules including supporting carers, assessment of carers and end of life care.

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A £10 charge to visit a GP would be just the start of a slippery slope for the NHS

June 22, 2014   Carers, disability, Featured Article, health, mental health

We either let our NHS be trashed by the privatisers and cutters, or we defend a properly funded, publicly run, universal system that is free at the point of use

A GP with a patient. ‘This ideological assault is being accompanied by an actual attempt to dismantle and privatise the NHS.’ Photograph: David Sillitoe for the Guardian

A slow hand clap for Andy McGovern, a London hospital nurse who has proposed that the Royal College of Nursing supports a £10 charge to visit a GP. On its own terms, the proposal is an unacceptable assault on the very foundations of the NHS: that it is free at the point of use. But the suggestion is so menacing because of where it originates from. The many enemies of the NHS – who have to be diplomatic, knowing that the NHS “is the closest the English have to a religion”, as Nigel Lawson once put it – will rejoice. “Aha!” they will think. “Now even the nurses are debating NHS charges, we have been given the political cover we need!”

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Carers unveil new book offering support

June 21, 2014   Carers, dementia, Featured Article, Scotland

Barbara Shearer (Mayfield), Wanda Gosz (Penicuik) and Patricia Thorp (Mayfield) at the launch of the new booklet

Midlothian carers have put pen to paper to produce a new booklet aimed at supporting people who care for those with dementia.

The booklet was launched as part of National Carers’ Week.

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