Home care package for 92 year old father

Hello mishap, I don't know anything specific about care packages for older people, but a friend of mine recently organised a care package for her adult autistic son.
She removed him from the residential home where he had been and bought a small house for him to share with another young man. They were given a budget by social services to pay for 24hour carers.
Although she and her husband interviewed and appointed the carers, they are not the legal employers, social services are.
Hope that helps and that you get something sorted out soon for your father

Can AgeUK help you with the information you need?

Personal assistants can be a great alternative to a residential care home as they can offer users more freedom and independence. While there’s no regulation of directly employed personal assistants, many will have a CRB (Criminal Records Bureau) check from previous employment, or nursing or medical qualifications. The most important thing to consider is finding the right personality – someone your dad feels comfortable with and who you are confident will offer him the right kind of care.

Agencies that employ home care workers (often called domiciliary care agencies) do have to be registered with CQC. Some of these organisations employ the staff directly, and some act as agencies for freelance care workers. And of course some of them will provide 24 hour live in care if that is what you require.

If your father did employ someone directly, he would be responsible for payroll management, health and safety checks, and taking out relevant insurance policies. This can be a confusing world for many people, but Find Me Good Care, a free online resource that helps people to understand care and support options might be able to help. Hopefully our page on employing personal assistants will answer any questions you have, and can point you in the right direction for next steps: http://www.findmegoodcare.co.uk/good-care-planner/care-and-the-law/employing-personal-assistants

Useful info.
My SIL recently grappled with this on behalf of MIL. . MIL has a very small care company (just 2 people) who are very nice. Met one this morning. Lovely woman. She also pays her friend a few hours a week to do cleaning and laundry and she has to be "on the books". No NI as she is over 60 but it has to be official employment not a cash transaction.
A very complicated system - the advantage is that the individual has more control over their package.

Very useful info SCIE - thanks very much.

Eventually we did find an agency who could cover the package, but Dad only lasted about 12 hours before finishing up in hospital where he remains at the moment - he has been quite unwell from side effects of the analgesia. Thye are struggling to get this right for him. The agency have offered to honour the package for 8 weeks - which is very decent of them as he only had 2 visits before he had to return to hospital.

MIL's carer brought her a bunch of daffodils.

We are so looking forward to getting Dad back to his home with his care package. Even though they went ion for such a short time, they were kind and caring.

I rang him today on his mobile in hospital and the first thing he said was that he was cold - he went on to say that he was naked - he had been washed then left in his single room without putting his clothes on. He could not reach his buzzer (and then tried to with much clattering and cries of pain). I feared he would fall out of bed whilst trying to get the buzzer, so I had to ring the ward and get them to go and sort him out. This sort of micromanagement of someone's care from 130 miles away is crazy - we had to do it when he was in his residential home NHS rehab placement too.

And the poor souls who have no family fighting their corner?

The nurses are meeting themsleves coming back - there are 28 difficult frail elderly patients on the one ward. They were most apologetic.

Mishap so frustrating for you and a huge worry. One expects that hospital is a safe environment. He is lucky to have you watching over him.

We find that having Mum in a home is almost as stressful as when she was living in her own home. We have to check on things all the time and we are paying quite a bit for the privilege! Luckily, we only live 12 miles away.

We found the same kitty when my dear late father in law was in home was constant checking up and luckily he was very near so could visit 2 or 3 times week spent all his savings on care bless him

Meant to say mishap is a worry in my late father in law home it was the quality of staff not amount sadly.

In evening they used to leave him in desperate need of care he was doubly incontinent and we would find at least 2 nurses on cigarette break!

Was very stressful and he was paying enormous sums of money for that!

It's a real b****r this old age business. We're having similar problems with my mum although the carers she had at home were good she deteriorated and now she's been in hospital for three weeks now while the doctors look for a diagnosis and we try to sort care out. (It should all be alright in the end - if she lives long enough.) I went in to visit today. It's a nice new hospital but there must be around 40 elderly patients in her ward - 4 x 6 bed rooms and the rest single rooms - but as far as I could see there were only two nurses around, doing their best, rushed off their feet from one bed pan request to the next. It's been like that every weekend.

Sorry Mishap I pressed the key before I'd sent you

Thanks - it is such a worry - I am on a total guilt trip at the moment as I should be down there, but being on crutches and having OH with PD is getting in the way - but I should be there. If only we could relax and be sure of good care.

Don't feel guilty. Your OH needs you and, as my DD2 tells me, you must put on your own oxygen mask before helping others. Look after yourself or you can't look after others. I know it's easier said than done - I've been visiting mum most days but still end up drowning my guilt most evenings - I hope my liver can take it!

How are you by the way? Any sign of loosing the crutches?

Appointment on 25th - it's a wait and see!

[Finger crossed] emoticon.

The irritates me about the care our parents are getting [and presumably us when the time comes] is that we should just enjoy visiting them and chatting to them when all we seem to do is chase around trying to sort things out before they become a huge disaster.

When I went on Friday I checked on Mum's medication chart (why do I feel the need to do that?) to discover she had not had something just before bed the previous evening. I told the Manager who said that the night staff had probably forgotten to log it We checked Mum's drugs cabinet and it did look, from the blister pack, as though she had actually had it. That's ok then!

Luckily, the three of us all live near enough to manage to visit Mum every other day between us but, as Mishap said, what if she didn't have any family to check?

Latest update..... my sister and I composed a letter to the consultant, which I emailed to him on Monday. It was basically saying that Dad is going doolally on opiate painkillers for a pain in his R hip/pelvis which is undiagnosed and wouldn't it be a great idea to find out what the pain is being caused by.

He then phoned my sister to say that they would investigate why he is in such pain on his R side and they would move him to the main ward where he can get help if needed.

I nagged again this morning on the phone and got a doctor to ring my sister with the x-ray results - he has "several" fractures in his R pelvis as well as the 2 on the left. These have gone undiagnosed for 2 months, in spite of prescibing opiates for his intolerable pain at that site. I cannot help but ask why they have only just found this out and why we had to write a letter to get them to look into it. Unbelievable.

Complain to the health authority and the daily mail!

Words fail me mishap

That is desperate

It's diabolical negligence.

Mishap Speak out! Make your feelings known. Surely this is another case of gross neglect. I'm prepared to sign a petition if it would help to get your message across.

If more people spoke out things would surely improve. I hope you feel you can.