Tag Archives: social care

Shock Norfolk social care shake-up after serious concerns raised

January 27, 2014   Carers, mental health, Norfolk, Social care, ukcuts

Serious concerns over the social care provided to adults with mental health issues has led to Norfolk County Council taking action

Monday, January 27, 2014
1:38 PM

Serious concerns over the social care provided to adults with mental health issues has led to Norfolk County Council taking action.

Serious concerns that social care for adults with mental health issues in Norfolk is not good enough has led to the county council taking responsibility for the service away from the mental health trust.

Norfolk County Council’s cabinet agreed to the move at a meeting today, which will see just over a hundred staff who had been transferred to the Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust five years ago go back to being managed from County Hall.

Issues around the service were aired at a meeting of the council’s community services overview and scrutiny panel in November.

Councillors at that meeting heard how, at one point, council bosses could not be confident the authority was fully meeting its legal obligations around care.

Bosses admitted then that the social care service for adults with mental health issues in Norfolk was not good enough, as they pledged to make improvements.

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Dying patients should be exempt from social care charges

January 15, 2014   Cancer, Carers, dementia, Social care, ukcuts
We need to talk about end-of-life care so fewer people face a lonely death in hospital. Free social care would be a start

theguardian.com,

 

A massage therapist works on the feet of a terminally ill hospice resident.

This week the care bill committee is debating who should be eligible for social care. MPs will also consider whether to add a clause that would enable exemption from social care charges for those at the end of their lives.

The amendment would also establish the need for better forward planning about where we would like to die. Most of us would prefer to be at home surrounded by the people we love, yet fewer than one in three are currently able to do so.

Why is it that 89% of those who die in hospital do so following an unplanned admission? In many cases it is because of the sheer exhaustion that comes with providing around-the-clock care. At the end of life there may be a period of days, but sometimes far longer, of complete dependency. Families go to enormous lengths to cope but, especially where there is only one person in a position to provide care, the elastic can only stretch so far.

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Home care for elderly cut by 25% in five years

December 18, 2013   Carers, Older care, ukcuts

Charities say thousands are being denied dignity and peace of mind because of council spending cuts

  • Cash-strapped authorities limiting provision with tougher rules
  • Number of elderly having meals on wheels almost halved in last two years
  • Number of pensioners receiving home care dropped 12% to 385,000
  • Age UK say figures show ‘how increasingly desperate the care crisis is’

By Sophie Borland

PUBLISHED: 00:18, 18 December 2013 | UPDATED: 00:18, 18 December 2013

 

Charities said thousands of elderly and other vulnerable adults are being denied dignity and peace of mind because of council spending cuts

The number of elderly people being given state-funded care in their homes has dropped by a quarter in just five years, according to official figures.

Charities said thousands of elderly and other vulnerable adults are being denied dignity and peace of mind because of council spending cuts.

Cash-strapped authorities nationwide are limiting their provision with tougher rules on who is entitled to receive help, despite the need growing as the population ages.

A total of 1.3million people receive state-funded home help, a place in a care home or hot meals – down from 1.7million in 2007-08.

In the last two years, the number of elderly having meals on wheels has almost halved from 45,000 to 23,000.

Meanwhile there has been a 12 per cent fall in those receiving home care, from 437,000 to 385,000.

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