Moving Mum from Scotland to England.

[blueboy]

After a lot of thought my brother and I are thinking Mum needs to go into care for her own safety in the near future. Mum currently lives in Scotland, as do I, but other family members live in Cheshire and I am the only family member now in Scotland. We would really like to find a care home close to the rest of the family and I would also move south. She would be self funding. Has anyone done this - if so, how did you move the PWD? I guess we could just drive here there?
Can anyone tell me if care home costs in Cheshire are similar to here - a good care home here is at least £1000 a week. Are there any more issues we should be considering?

 

[Missy]

Don't know about Cheshire, but my sister and I have just arranged for our Aunt to go into a lovely care home in Lancashire which is £1000 a week - that is top of the range compared to the others we looked at.

 

[fizzie]

There are a few things I would do if I was looking for a care home
Firstly I would go to a carers cafe in the area I wanted to be - google carers cafe and the area and then carers organisation with the area - they are often run by different organisations but it doesn't matter because in this instance the purpose of going is to get informal verbal information on local care homes which you won't get anywhere else - people talk and they are more than happy to tell you all the good and bad at these coffee mornings.

Then go and look at the shortlist which by now you will have - taking with you a checklist like http://www.ageuk.org.uk/home-and-care/care-homes/care-home-checklist/location-and-building/

and at the same time check them out on this Care Quality Commission site - don't bother to look at anything that isn't Good as the minimum standard
http://www.cqc.org.uk/content/inspection-reports

after that it is gut instinct on where she would be most comfortable

That's what I would do to give me the best chance of finding something decent.
Most people reckon on between 750 and 900 and the price doesn't necessarily reflect the quality of the care

Hope that helps

 

[jugglingmum]

It depends what level you need I suppose.

I am in Ellesmere Port and there are a couple near me which are under £600 a week, which a colleague has moved her MIL and mum into. Her mum was then moved to a sister home as her dementia was too much to cope with, and she is on the dementia wing, I don't know if the cost has gone up.

There is a luxury one near Chester a couple of miles from me, which I'm told charges £1200 a week. Cheshire is a large area so it probably depends on where in Cheshire you are planning to go.

 

[blueboy]

Quick replies!! TP is fab! I am looking at the Macclesfield, Middlewich etc area. I would be living in Middlewich as the grandchildren are there but brother lives in Macclesfield. I am a bit far away to visit carers' cafes though. Have been looking homes online but if anyone knows any good ones in the area please PM me.Thank you everyone.

 

[fizzie]

You could get your brother to go along to get the local gen
Another thing to watch out for is if they are likely to move her as she progresses - one of the questions to ask - a move can be upsetting for everyone as familiarity of carers and routines are often more important than we think

 

[blueboy]

Thanks, Fizzie but brother tries not to get very involved, sadly. Maybe sis in law could do that though..

 

[Blackcat20]

Hi Blueboy,

I moved my Mum with Alzheimer's from Scotland to a care home near me in Yorkshire in 2013, and one issue you might like to think about is the local authority funding allocation which is available for personal care in Scotland (where it is free) but not in England.

As in your case, my Mum was self-funding and so in theory she could have moved anywhere without the involvement of Social Services, but I was advised by the Scottish LA that if she did have an assessment (care needs and finance) by Social Services in Scotland before moving, the Scottish LA might still cover the costs of her personal care. I followed this advice, and although it involved filling in several forms and delayed the move by a few weeks, it was worth it as the Scottish LA agreed to pay £241 per week for Mum's personal care towards her care home fees in England.

Sadly my Mum died just over a year after the move, but the Scottish LA would have paid the personal care allowance indefinitely (and would also have taken over her full fees if her resources had run out). They liaised with the care home about her needs before she moved, and two social workers even came down to visit her after six weeks (it was the first cross-border placement the LA had made, and they were interested in seeing how the system worked).

My Mum was in a community hospital before moving, and she was transported down by a Scottish Ambulance Service minibus (without any charge to us). This was also arranged by the social worker who did the assessment. The reason that the LA was so helpful was that Mum had no close family left in Scotland, and the assessment showed that it was important for her emotional needs to be near to me. This might apply to your family too, if you are going to move south.

If I had not involved Social Services, I was told that I could just arrange everything individually for Mum, pay all of the care home fees and transport her there myself (or pay for a private ambulance). In that case, it would eventually have been the English LA which would have had to take over her funding.

I hope that all goes well for your Mum and that you work out the best way to arrange the move. The move south worked out well for my Mum, as she had a very happy final year when I saw her every day, so in my view you are doing the right thing.

Best wishes,

Blackcat

 

[blueboy]

Thank you Blackcat - really useful info. I had wondered about the Scottish care contribution - makes a big difference at the moment as all her home care is free. I will look into this..

 

[blueboy]

As an add on, Blackcat, Mum has had a needs assessment by Social services and thus has 4 x daily carers but, as this is free in Scotland, hasn't had a financial assessment. How would I go about getting this? Her social worker ( hospital based after a 2 week hospital stay last year) has moved on as they have changed the service. Is a financial assessment necessary? Or would Mum get the Scottish care component automatically now if she moved to England?

 

[Blackcat20]

Hi Blueboy,

In my Mum's case, it was the (hospital-based) social worker who arranged the needs assessment who also got the financial assessment underway, and it was on her advice that we had it done as apparently it was part of the process of creating a "care responsibility" of the Scottish LA for Mum. My Mum had not actually had any home care packages prior to going in to hospital, as she had insisted on struggling on at home with only my help, so perhaps your situation will be different. If you already have a home care package in place, the Scottish LA is already clearly responsible for your Mum's care, so perhaps the personal care payment element would just automatically transfer across to England? Presumably someone in your social services department could advise you.

The financial review forms I had to complete (as Mum's POA) were not too onerous, as they just consisted of details to fill in about Mum's savings, value of house etc. Shortly after the review I got a letter stating that the LA confirmed Mum was self-funding, but that they would pay the Scottish personal care element directly to the York care home as part of their ongoing responsibility for her care. The letter also stated that the Scottish LA would pay the full care home fees after the resources I had detailed in the form had been reduced to the Scottish level of eligibility for LA funding. I just had to give the LA the details of the care home I had chosen, and they liaised directly with them.

I looked at lots of cross-border placement information online at the time of moving Mum, and nowhere was it stated that the Scottish LA would still pay the personal care element in England, so maybe it is discretionary and dependent on individual needs. The emotional needs/family contact dimension is definitely very important in person-centred dementia care, so I would emphasise strongly that the move would be in your Mum's best interests, and that the financial support provided would only be what she would be getting in Scotland anyway (and is already getting in her home care package).

Best of luck for a good outcome for you and your Mum!

Blackcat

 

[blueboy]

Thank you very much, Blackcat!