Tag Archives: social care
Why don’t they listen to what carers have to say?
True integration involves the NHS, local councils and families
Families are the biggest providers of care, yet carers can find themselves cut out of decision-making and bounced between different bureaucracies
Norman Lamb and Heléna Herklots
Guardian Professional, Wednesday 15 May 2013 08.30 BST
The 6.5 million carers in the UK providing unpaid care to their loved ones outnumber all NHS and social care staff put together.
Caring is a fact of life. Whether a partner falls ill, or a parent needs support as they grow older, or a child is born with a disability – it will affect us all at some point.
At times like these, families pull together to support each other. But too often they find that the services there to support them don’t do the same.
Elderly patients face longer hospital waits for care home transfer
Elderly patients are waiting more than a month in an NHS hospital before being transferred into a care home, campaigners warn today.
By Andrew Hough
6:30AM BST 14 May 2013
Researchers found older people are waiting on average three days longer in hospital for a residential home position than when the Coalition government took office.
Experts said this meant the NHS hospitals were funding a substantially higher proportion of social care costs because of “needless” waiting by patients.
Health officials are currently grappling with accident and emergency wards that are full to bursting, with part of the problem attributed to delays in discharging patients from hospitals.
Bleak outlook ahead because of the cuts to social care
Extra investment ‘needed to make care cap work’
By Nick Triggle Health correspondent, BBC News
The government’s commitment to reform social care will require greater investment, ministers have been told.
A bill limiting the cost to disabled and elderly people of their social care will form part of the government’s legislative programme for the next year, the Queen’s Speech revealed.
Previously ministers had proposed introducing a cap of £72,000 in 2016.
But campaigners and council chiefs told ministers budget cuts were already putting the system at risk.
Research by the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) suggests the £16bn budget for social care, including services for both elderly and disabled people, is likely to be trimmed by £800m in the next 12 months.
