social services are trying to put my mother in a care home

missmouse

Registered User
Jan 19, 2012
51
0
Kent
I have contacted you before when I needed to and you have been there for me. I always thought that I would be happy for my elderly mother who has Parkinson's and Lewy Body Dementia to go into a care home. Well I find myself not wanting that now and it is not because I am filled with guilt about her going into a care home. It may be a part but I actually want her to see out her days with me as she is my mother and I don't have any other relatives. When she goes I will be an orphan in my sixties!

I work full time and now she is bed bound so I have eight carers, four times a day, seven days a week for her to help me care for her. This care is partly funded by Social Services plus I also pay for extra private care. Since we have used this care agency, SS told me it was only temporary, but she has been with them now for 10 months. They don't wish to care for her any longer because they say she takes longer than the times SS allocated. Also SS say the agency is too expensive and claim it costs £51,000 a year. Most of the other care in my borough for the same amount of care, costs £25-30 k so I am not sure why this agency is so expensive.

The last day of care with this agency is 10 Feb. SS have contacted me and said that their brokers cannot find eight carers a day to look after my mother, so have informed me that the only option is a care home or that I have a direct payment. If SS are going to give me £51k a year that is fine but I think not!

I am really getting scared now that there will be no domiciliary care and my mother will be forced into a care home. I can afford some private care but not £51k per year and I would imagine that the direct payment that will be offered will not be enough to cover her care. I think SS will keep me hanging on until it is too late and a care home is swiftly arranged for her. Because I have written an email and phoned twice and they maintain they are out and unable to talk just yet - they email me this response.

Can anyone make any suggestions please. I do know that if SS feel that a care home is cheaper that is all they will offer. I have asked if they can use two agencies, say use one for breakfast and lunch and the other one for tea and bedtime but they say no.
 

jenniferpa

Registered User
Jun 27, 2006
39,442
0
Celia started a thread to the story on the link below, it looks like the LA's are starting to use care homes instead of care at home when the latter becomes the more expensive.
K

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/23/13000-pensioners-could-forced-care-homes-against-will/

I wouldn't actually say "started". LA's have always taken the position that if they are funding the care then at the point it becomes more expensive to provide the necessary home care, a care home is the most likely result.
 

Spamar

Registered User
Oct 5, 2013
7,723
0
Suffolk
I read that story, it was in several of the papers. I think LAs are just being more upfront about it. Once care in the home is more expensive than care in a care home, it's obvious to me that the person concerned will be requested to move. Otherwise it's not using the LAs money - our money, which is now in short supply- in the bast way. If you were self funding, you would be allowed to do as you like.
 

Pickles53

Registered User
Feb 25, 2014
2,474
0
Radcliffe on Trent
I read that story, it was in several of the papers. I think LAs are just being more upfront about it. Once care in the home is more expensive than care in a care home, it's obvious to me that the person concerned will be requested to move. Otherwise it's not using the LAs money - our money, which is now in short supply- in the bast way. If you were self funding, you would be allowed to do as you like.

You have to have sympathy for LAs here. They have no choice but to try and stretch the inadequate funding they are given to help as many people as possible. Otherwise, in order to fund some individuals' preferences, others might lose out completely. Every public service works this way. I might prefer my child's class only to have ten kids in it, but unless I go to a private school it won't be possible.
 

Risa

Registered User
Apr 13, 2015
479
0
Essex
Missmouse, in your shoes I would be phoning around care agencies in surrounding areas to find out firstly how easy it would be to get enough carers in as often as you needed and then to find out an approx cost. If SS come back to you to discuss direct payments, you would at least have a rough idea of how much money you would need to make direct payments a realistic option. If you struggle to find care agencies that can provide the carers or the costs are too high, is there any possibility of reducing the number of visits? Are you able to work from home or cut your working hours?

It would probably be worth visiting local care homes. While it might not be your preferred option, you would have seen what is available. If the LA agreed to disregard your Mum's house and you found a home you were happy with, your feelings may change.
 
Last edited:

nita

Registered User
Dec 30, 2011
2,651
0
Essex
I read this article yesterday and if you read it carefully you will see it refers to the "NHS" and "Continuing Healthcare funding". My mother was receiving this for care at home until she passed away before Christmas, so this would have been a fear of mine if it had been an issue with our local CCG.

The article doesn't refer to Local Authorities at all but I suppose there is a possibility that they will go down the same route if care at home is more expensive than residential care.

I don't see why the Direct Payment should be any less than the amount provided to the care agency for the current care the OP is getting - i.e. 8 carer visits a day. Then she can top up as she has been doing. In our area there is a service whereby the direct payments can be administered by a charity associated with the council, thereby taking all the worry out of it. You could just apply to other care agencies to see if they have the capacity to cover the visits required or look into hiring people directly.




Celia started a thread to the story on the link below, it looks like the LA's are starting to use care homes instead of care at home when the latter becomes the more expensive.
K

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/23/13000-pensioners-could-forced-care-homes-against-will/
 

missmouse

Registered User
Jan 19, 2012
51
0
Kent
Thank you all for your help. I have the day off work on Monday and will phone round some care agencies then and see what I can come up with. I am trying to get in touch with social services but they appear to have gone to ground now.

Just for the record, it is my house, not my mother's she lives with me. She used to rent but has lived with me for 6 years since my father died.
 

flossielime

Registered User
May 8, 2014
201
0
Can I ask if 2 carers are absolutely essential? I assume it is for transfers. I think some hoists - maybe a ceiling mounted one can be operated be one carer.

I have live in care for my dad, it is cheaper than you might think and you could use a direct payment to pay for some of it. Obviously they need their own room. I have been absolutely delighted with the care my day gets from the agency I use. Please Pm me if you're interested in the details.
 

Bod

Registered User
Aug 30, 2013
1,958
0
I have contacted you before when I needed to and you have been there for me. I always thought that I would be happy for my elderly mother who has Parkinson's and Lewy Body Dementia to go into a care home. Well I find myself not wanting that now and it is not because I am filled with guilt about her going into a care home. It may be a part but I actually want her to see out her days with me as she is my mother and I don't have any other relatives. When she goes I will be an orphan in my sixties!

I work full time and now she is bed bound so I have eight carers, four times a day, seven days a week for her to help me care for her. This care is partly funded by Social Services plus I also pay for extra private care. Since we have used this care agency, SS told me it was only temporary, but she has been with them now for 10 months. They don't wish to care for her any longer because they say she takes longer than the times SS allocated. Also SS say the agency is too expensive and claim it costs £51,000 a year. Most of the other care in my borough for the same amount of care, costs £25-30 k so I am not sure why this agency is so expensive.

The last day of care with this agency is 10 Feb. SS have contacted me and said that their brokers cannot find eight carers a day to look after my mother, so have informed me that the only option is a care home or that I have a direct payment. If SS are going to give me £51k a year that is fine but I think not!

I am really getting scared now that there will be no domiciliary care and my mother will be forced into a care home. I can afford some private care but not £51k per year and I would imagine that the direct payment that will be offered will not be enough to cover her care. I think SS will keep me hanging on until it is too late and a care home is swiftly arranged for her. Because I have written an email and phoned twice and they maintain they are out and unable to talk just yet - they email me this response.

Can anyone make any suggestions please. I do know that if SS feel that a care home is cheaper that is all they will offer. I have asked if they can use two agencies, say use one for breakfast and lunch and the other one for tea and bedtime but they say no.


To be brutally honest, its your feelings that are against your mother being in a Care home.
As you work, and have 4 visits a day, there will be times when she is alone.
4 doubled visits, is usually accepted as the limit of "at home" care. Once more than this is required, then Residential Care is the better option. Staff available 24/7, specialist equipment, etc.
As you say, you will not get the full spending package you feel you need to continue.
Now is the time to be choosing the right home for your mothers needs.
Usually a list of suitable places will be provided(that also accept LA funding) it's your job to pick the best suited.
Go see them all, do not give warning that your coming, just turn up, good ones will be happy to see you, not all will have immediate space, and you may have to go on a waiting list, for your chosen ones.

Your mother will not agree to go. They rarely do!! If you wait for an emergency situation to arise, you will have no say in what happens, when or where.
This needs strength on your part, to get the best for your mother.

I speak from experience, as do many others on here.

Bod
 

missmouse

Registered User
Jan 19, 2012
51
0
Kent
To be brutally honest, its your feelings that are against your mother being in a Care home.
As you work, and have 4 visits a day, there will be times when she is alone.
4 doubled visits, is usually accepted as the limit of "at home" care. Once more than this is required, then Residential Care is the better option. Staff available 24/7, specialist equipment, etc.
As you say, you will not get the full spending package you feel you need to continue.
Now is the time to be choosing the right home for your mothers needs.
Usually a list of suitable places will be provided(that also accept LA funding) it's your job to pick the best suited.
Go see them all, do not give warning that your coming, just turn up, good ones will be happy to see you, not all will have immediate space, and you may have to go on a waiting list, for your chosen ones.

Your mother will not agree to go. They rarely do!! If you wait for an emergency situation to arise, you will have no say in what happens, when or where.
This needs strength on your part, to get the best for your mother.

I speak from experience, as do many others on here.

Bod

Thank you all once again for all your help. However, I think some of you may be missing the point. My mother doesn't want to go into a care home and I don't want her to go into one either. Am I the only person who wants my elderly relative with me?

She used to cause me problems I admit but now she is mainly serene (without medication). She does have four double handed visits from social services seven days a week but I also provide additional private care for her. When I see what she has now become I want her to be at my home with me.

She is not left on her own all day. She has a very comfortable bedroom, visitors and good food provided by me. Social Services have admitted to me that she is very well cared for and the psychiatrist from the memory clinic has told me a nursing home is not the place for her. I balance my lifestyle as well as caring for my mother. I still manage holidays etc. Not as much free time as before obviously. What I would like advice on is how to get Social Services proactive and not leave sourcing an agency for me and to stop mentioning a nursing home as being the only option when it is not.

If my mother was showing severe anxiety and I had difficulty coping with her then I would have to think carefully about a care home. But now she is obviously coming to the end of her life and is happy watching the chase on the TV why does she have to be carted off to a care home? She is also on hardly any medication so her medical needs are not complex.

I do feel sad when I keep hearing that nursing homes are the only option when they are not. I do know there are good homes of course. But these elderly people now are us in a few years time.
 

Spamar

Registered User
Oct 5, 2013
7,723
0
Suffolk
Whoa missmouse. Care home might not be the answer for you and I completely respect that. But it might not be the answer for everybody, so please don't denigrate us. My husband didn't go into care, which was meant to be respite for 2 weeks, until one Easter when he had 2 Tia's and 2 falls. Minor Tia's I can cope with, he had lots of them over the years, falls, I couldn't cope with as I couldn't lift him and he couldn't help. Straighten your legs meant nothing to him!
Just be thankful your mother is not like that!
He died 3 months later btw.
 

missmouse

Registered User
Jan 19, 2012
51
0
Kent
Hello. Sorry to offend anyone, I am not suggesting of course, that care homes are not appropriate places for people. Several of my friends have their elderly relatives in care homes and they seem fine. I am saying that for me personally and for my mother it is not the way forward. I wrote my post asking for information about how to keep Social Services from trying to put my mother in care home when it is not in her best interests. I don't want to receive emails saying I am denouncing care homes and people who put their relatives in them. I never meant to say that. I apologise for people who think that.

I am fortunate that I can afford to supplement my mother's care with private care. I am also fortunate that I have a full time job that means I have a life outside of caring for my mother and I am able to go out to the theatre etc in the evenings and on holiday because I pay for private care, so my mental health is fine - I am not with my mother 24 hours a day but as I said she is no trouble at all now. I also have a flexible working pattern whereby I can be at home for all my mother's appointments. To me it is unfair to try and get a person into a care home when they are being looked after perfectly well at home. The problem I have is finding a care company who have the staff to do four double handed calls seven days a week. I am not apologising for the fact that I love my mother, who brought me up to be a reasonably decent human being and make sacrifices along the way. I feel I owe her to be make her final days happy.

Once again I apologise for any offence I may have caused.
 

Bod

Registered User
Aug 30, 2013
1,958
0
No apologies needed.
It does sound like you are managing wonderfully, and long may it continue.
Compared to some on here you are having a very smooth easy ride.
Speaking from our more difficult situations, what are you going to do, should your mother become far more ill?
There are family Carers, who have had to beg Social Services for half the interest that is being shown to you. They have had breakdowns, because of the strain of coping with a very difficult/aggressive(mentally and or physically) person, often on their own.
Whilst you are able to financially support the correct level of care for your mother, I doubt the Social Services will intervene, as your paying, they don't have to.
It might be that your mothers financial assessment, has brought her care cost to their attention, there is no obligation for you to subsidise her care, therefore the most cost effective measure for them is a Care Home placement.

Bod
 

Spamar

Registered User
Oct 5, 2013
7,723
0
Suffolk
You're OK. If you are self funding I don't think SS usually bother. They certainly didn't with me. He went in for respite when I wanted, though once it was strongly recommended cos I was in the middle of carers breakdown! There is only me and I have health problems as well. When I was working the days were too long to deal with him as well, so worked stopped. Though I do remember taking him with me on a couple of residential courses! Everybody looked out for him!
 

canary

Registered User
Feb 25, 2014
25,018
0
South coast
I understand that you want your mum to remain with you and that your mum doesnt want to go into a care home. None of us take the decision for our loved ones to go into a care home lightly, but sometimes it is the only way.

I think what people are trying to say is that you are unlikely to be able to get SS to be proactive about this. They are only willing to spend a certain level of money (exactly how much depends on the LA) on care at home and if they cant find a care company who is willing to take on the amount of care required for the amount that they will spend, then they will look towards a care home.

There is nothing to stop you and your mum staying at your home - except that you may have to pay more.
 

BR_ANA

Registered User
Jun 27, 2012
1,080
0
Brazil
I am saying that for me personally and for my mother it is not the way forward. I wrote my post asking for information about how to keep Social Services from trying to put my mother in care home when it is not in her best interests.

You answered your question. If your mum's best interest is your home, it is. However, it seems (for me) your plan may have some fails that could be fixed.
I.e.
- Emergency access to your home, maybe it worth a chat with firefighters about alarms and fast access. ( she may be alone after one carer and before the other)
- wandering.
- opening door to strangers. Or buying or giving money to cold callers.
- lack of activities (my mum was on gymnastics and on art classes when she was at home).

I tried to care for mum at home while working, however I couldn't. My big failure was that I was her carer at night, and after 2 hrs of sleep I had to work.
 
Last edited:

missmouse

Registered User
Jan 19, 2012
51
0
Kent
Thank you. My mother has lived with me for nearly 7 years. She is bedbound so doesn't walk. She has a carelink pendant that she can use in an emergency. I have a keysafe which various people know including the carelink operators and various other people which need to enter my house.
 

Jessbow

Registered User
Mar 1, 2013
5,678
0
Midlands
So your predicament is where to source carers in addition to SS 4 times a day or as well as?

SS are Withdrawing their own carers ( or their contracted carers) and you need replacements or 'in addition to'

how many hours are you looking to cover? you might be better looking for a private nurse from say 8am > 5pm if you/Mum are going to be picking up the tab
 

Staff online

Forum statistics

Threads
138,128
Messages
1,993,223
Members
89,789
Latest member
Anne Paterson