Tag Archives: Local government

Who would care for my Mum? Or for yours?

Posted on May 14, 2013 by | Leave a comment

Imagine that one day your Mum is at home enjoying her retirement. She has always been highly independent, fit and well. Until the day she has a stroke.

After a short stay in hospital she comes home. But life is different now. It’s much harder for her to do everyday things. She struggles getting in and out of the bath and even using the shower is a challenge. There are times when reaching the toilet is too much. You have to face the fact that she cannot manage on her own any more.

-2934You do the most sensible thing. You get in touch with Mum’s local social services. You explain the difficulties she is now having. They assess her needs. You hope this leads to some carers coming in to give Mum a hand with those things she is finding too much, like getting to the toilet, washing and preparing simple meals.

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Posted in Campaigning, Care in Crisis

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Who can I turn to? Information and advice services for older people

Posted on April 16, 2013 by | 2 Comments

This blog was contributed by Lucy Harmer, Age UK’s Head of Services.

Many older people experience a complex interaction between living on a relatively low fixed income, declining health and mobility, and risk of social isolation. They need holistic, independent information and advice (I&A) from advisers with experience and knowledge of their specific issues. Good-quality I&A is essential to enable people to access entitlements and services in order to maintain a decent quality of life and to continue to live independently. Timely interventions can prevent increased pressure on health and social care services. This is especially important when people in later life and the services they rely on are experiencing unprecedented change and challenges. Unfortunately, many older people struggle to find the support that they need as they navigate a complex system, often against a background of cuts to provision or changes in eligibility.

Government policy increasingly focuses on extending choice in public services,440x210_man-woman-reading increasing independence and giving people more personal responsibility. If older people are to benefit from these developments, the government must ensure that they have access to the I&A they need to make informed decisions. Failure to access I&A when it is needed can increase the risk of long-term or multiple problems. Continue reading →

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Posted in Campaigning, General

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Government responds to the Francis Inquiry

Posted on March 27, 2013 by | 5 Comments

The first inquiry into Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust  catalogued extensive examples of neglectful care and appalling patient experiences. Stories of people being ignored, dehydrated, abused were visible signs of an organisation that had forgotten basic principles of care and at worst, wilfully put organisational considerations ahead of patients. Many, if not most, of the patients involved were older people.

The second inquiry reported in February and included 290 recommendations
that could help to avoid the same situation arising again, not just in Staffordshire, but throughout the NHS. You can see what we said about it in our blog. 440x210_care_home

The government yesterday gave its response to the report in a paper titled Patients first and foremost, and there’s much to be positive about in what it says.

The paper outlines changes to how services are regulated, reflecting an on-going review by the health and care regulator the Care Quality Commission (CQC). It describes much wider use of expert inspectors in hospitals including members of the public that bring expertise derived from their experience of care. Continue reading →

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Posted in Campaigning, care homes, Commission on Improving Dignity in Care, Government, Health, Health and Wellbeing, Home and Care, Social care

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Guest blog – LGiU C’llr awards winner!

Posted on March 17, 2013 by | 1 Comment

This blog was contributed by Sue Cooley from Manchester City Council, the winner of the Age UK award  category of the LGiU Councillor Achievement Awards. This award recognises the achievements of a councillor who has championed the interests of older people in their community. 

I have been a councillor since 1996 representing Brooklands ward in the city of Manchester. My role as lead member for Valuing Older People (VOP) and more recently the Age Friendly Manchester Programme began in the last years of the 1990s. At that time I worked closely with the then deputy leader of the council  to develop an approach which said that the role of local authorities shouldn’t begin and end with its social care responsibilities, recognising that the vast majority of older residents -however we define them, do not get a social care services. Moreover, especially in a city like Manchester, many older people faced exclusion from a range of everyday services and activities.

This approach found an echo in the Better Government for Older People Awardsprogramme championed by the Labour Government in the late 1990s. When ground breaking research into ageing in cities (including Manchester) was published in 2002 it coincided with the council’s new project called Valuing Older People which was launched officially in 2003.

Since then VOP has grown from a modest project based in the Manchester Joint Health Unit to a wide ranging programme acknowledged as being innovative but at the same time rooted in Manchester communities. Continue reading →

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Posted in Campaigning, Communities and inclusion, Local government

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