Was my mother horrifically unlucky or is it generalized? A discussion on improving support for dementia patients.

[Toopie28]

Well, at least social care is free in Scotland. In England you pay every penny of the costs if you have savings of over about £23K and most of the costs with even modest savings.

Oh I believe it's the same in Scotland. It's not free if you have savings.

At least not in my experience. I had to submit all financials. Ma just fell under that (actually we had a joint account - mine but at that time (almost 10 years ago) I added her in case I died so she could access it - they took that into account too)

So with that (just under), I contribute to care costs.
Again, that's fine as I have savings but there are a lot of people that don't.

 

[Jessbow]

The comments around money really touched me because it's a subject we carers are gaslighted on all the time. Thank you everyone. I will inform myself about the various, clearly lacking funding options in the UK, as well as other policies.

Gaslighted? The funding structure is clearly defined and consistent for all.
We might not like the structure- but its there

 

[Canna]

In Scotland, free personal care is available to all adults who have been assessed by the local authority as eligible for these services - this is not means-tested. It meant that although Mum had savings, we didn't have to pay for home visits by carers. We could have received up to 4 carer visits a day (although in practice we didn't, because there were insufficient carers available).

As long as the move to a care home has been approved by social services, you continue to receive £230 a week towards your care home costs, even if you are fully self-funding. And I believe there is an additional supplement if nursing is required.

Although it's a drop in the ocean of care home fees, it helps, and is certainly better than the situation in England, where I think you have to fund your own carers?