Care home can no longer meet dads needs - now what!

[referee50]

Just had the call none of us ever want to receive, the Care Home where my Dad has been for nearly 3 years is no longer able to meet his needs. It has been brewing for a while, his continence is getting worse, he is refusing personal care and has become violent with staff when they attempt it. They have tried their best and all correct protocols have been followed, but after a weekend of increased agitation and lashing out, today they have to notify the local care team of the situation. They are also arranging a continuing health care assessment.
Has anyone else been in this position, I feel pretty helpless. As I live 200 miles away I was hoping that if it came to this I could try to get him moved nearer to me, but this obviously won't happen overnight, especially as I am theoretically in a different country (Wales). Can I expect them to move him into alternative care as soon as they can find somewhere they consider more suitable?

 

[Kevinl]

You can move him out of the area and the Local Authority where he currently lives pay the new authority (assuming he's LA funded not self funding). It may be that cost of care in Wales is lower than the area he currently lives in otherwise he may need a top up to make up the difference.
For now you need to contact the Social Services for the area he lives in and get them to do an assessment of his needs and a list of suitable EMI nursing homes in the are.
Ultimately it is the job of the Adult Care section in Social Services to sort this out but they'll quite happily leave it up to you if they can (should I add "get away with it"?).
I'd try and work with the current home, stay on-side with them and get the local care team moving, if you can find a home with a place the move can happen quite quickly but you'll need the assessment so you can get an idea of what budget the LA will make available and what you can do within that.
K

 

[cloudy]

Hi referee 50
I went through this just over a year ago.
It was a real stress as the dementia care home manager said the wrong thing to me when I asked about timelines. She mentioned 4 weeks or something to me and mentioned if I don't find somewhere else for him, they would move him to hospital!!!!

I ended up viewing a dozen dementia nursing homes in the space of a week all by myself.

They said they couldn't look after dads needs anymore either. The problem was his dementia included behaviour where he would pee on the floor around the home. They tried all the continents stuff but didn't work. And they did not want to change the carpet to laminates. So they wanted to move dad instead. Dad was also borderline nursing care under the continuing healthcare assessment part.

I actually moved dad 100 miles away from his home to near me so you can too. It will however be a new team of social workers and doctors and everything to look after him.

The new nursing home I picked is much better at looking after dad and they have laminate flooring. They do also look after the more challenging dementia people so have been trained better I think to look after them.

After a few months there, dad was no longer anywhere near requiring nursing care under his continuing healthcare assessment review!

After all the stress of worrying about settling him again into a new care home, it's worked out as the current place is much better at looking after him. He settled in surprisingly well very quickly.

I have heard though that if they do get to a stage where even a nursing dementia home can't look after them anymore eg if they get too violent and it can't be managed or controlled in a nursing home, that it's unsafe for other residents and staff and the person concerned, that they go to hospital. I dont really know what that means..

The care or nursing home and social workers I expect would review the medication to calm them down and look at what triggers the lashing out to help the home manage.

Perhaps start looking at some of the nursing dementia homes near you. The good ones get full quick and I found it very useful to view so many. Although the social worker did help after I looked at all those places to help me narrow things down in terms of what I thought was essential for dad and what I wanted.

If you speak to a local nursing dementia home, the manager should be able to talk you through the process of moving. It normally involves them carrying out an assessment of your dad so you will have to speak with them on of they would be willing to go to see 200 miles away or if they would want you to bring dad up to see them.

If it's a larger group of nursing homes, they may beable to use someone else within the same group of nursing homes who is nearer to your dad now, to do the assessment.

Good luck!

 

[tigerlady]

I haven't been in your position exactly, but when my husband was at the assessment centre at the hospital, his behaviour was violent during personal care, and sometimes he was aggressive at other times to the nurses and other patients. Due to this, I could not find a care home within the LA budget that would take him. He was assessed for CHC and as he scored severe on behaviour and cognition he qualified for CHC. He is now in a good nursing home which has staff trained in coping with challenging behaviour, which we could never have afforded without CHC.

If your Dad qualifies for this, it will take away the worry of funding, and you can just concentrate on finding the best home that can manage his needs.