Category Archives: DOH
100% personal budgets target scrapped
Care minister says councils must have 70% of service users on personal budgets by April 2013, ditching 100% ambition.
Pic Credit: Rex Features
The government has scrapped its target for councils to move all service users in the community on to personal budgets by April 2013, care minister Norman Lamb announced today.
Lamb said he had agreed a new target of having 70% of users on personal budgets by the same date, following talks with the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services.
Lamb said personal budgets were not suitable for everyone, but stressed that the 70% target was a staging post and should not be seen as a ceiling.
His announcement, at the National Children and Adult Services Conference, was strongly welcomed by Adass president Sarah Pickup.
She said that it would mean councils could stop “chasing a number” and focus on outcomes.
Lamb also issued a strong personal commitment to implementing the Dilnot commission’s proposals of a cap on the care costs faced by individuals.
Winterbourne View: Care workers jailed for abuse
Six out of 11 care workers who admitted a total of 38 charges of neglect or abuse of patients at a private hospital have been jailed.
Five other workers from Winterbourne View near Bristol were given suspended sentences after the acts of abuse were uncovered by BBC Panorama.
Ringleader Wayne Rogers, 32, who admitted nine counts of ill-treating patients, was jailed for two years.
Judge Neil Ford QC said there was a “culture of cruelty” at the care home.
‘Vile and inexcusable’
Primary care holds the key to raising quality of dementia patients' lives
New campaign launches to tackle dementia stigma and drive concerned people to consult their GP
In recent years dementia has fallen into the healthcare spotlight and will remain there for some time as our ageing population continues to grow and, as a result, the number of people with dementia rises.
This increase in the number of people with dementia is also due to the ability to better diagnose the disorder – although England’s diagnosis rate remains quite low at 42%, on average.
Without a diagnosis as a starting point, people are denied access to support, help and potential treatments that can help them live well with dementia.
Timely diagnosis requires a committed focus, and so a new Department of Health awareness campaign, supported by the Alzheimer’s Society, starts this month.
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