‘Cuts forcing English councils to limit social care’

September 14, 2014   Carers, Featured Article, Older care, Social care, ukcuts

95-year-old Cyril Gillam no longer gets home help visits

14 September 2014 Last updated at 03:44

Almost 90% of councils in England no longer offer social care to people whose needs are ranked low to moderate, the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (Adass) has said.

The group is warning cuts are making the care system “unsustainable”.

The government says councils have been given an extra £1.1bn to help protect social care this year.

But charities say hundreds of thousands of people are struggling without help.

When someone applies for social care, their needs are determined as either critical, substantial, moderate or low.

In recent years the number of councils able to help those at the lower end of the scale has gone down as they struggle to balance their budgets.

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The unending grief of the dementia carer

September 13, 2014   Carers, dementia, Featured Article

Unpaid family carers shoulder two-thirds of the staggering £26 billion that the condition costs this country every year.

Posted on 12th September 2014 in Blogs 0
Pippa Kelly
Just as I was about to post this week’s blog I set it aside in favour of another.   I did so because of a remarkable interview on Radio 4 between John Humphrys, the Today programme’s resident Rottweiler, and Denise Stevens, who cares for her husband Mike, who has dementia.It’s only a few months since I devoted a blog to another Humphrys’ interview in which two people with dementia, and their spouses (and  carers) were given the prime-time 8.10am slot to explain what it was really like to live with the condition.   I described this as a significant step towards normalising dementia.

So I hesitated before inflicting John Humphrys, Radio 4 and the Today programme on anyone yet again – it hardly seems fair.  But it was such an insightful, moving piece that I felt compelled to do so, particularly as it has just been revealed that those with dementia and their unpaid family carers shoulder two-thirds of the staggering £26 billion that the condition costs this country every year.

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Dementia care will reach many

September 12, 2014   Alzheimer’s, Carers, dementia, Featured Article, Norfolk

 Actress and comedian Helen Lederer speaks.

Picture: DENISE BRADLEY

Friday, September 12, 2014
6:30 AM

With one in three over-65s expected to die with dementia, Kim Briscoe finds out how we are caring for the growing number of people with the condition.

It can be a bewildering and frustrating condition, in which carers are put under an enormous strain and family members see the person they once knew disappear bit by bit.

With more and more people expected to be diagnosed with dementia, it poses a huge challenge to our health and social care system.

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