social care Archives - Page 2 of 2

How to Talk About Care Needs with Someone You Love

Posted on 10 April 2019 by dukadmin

Put yourself in the position of an older person who is starting to struggle with everyday tasks, or perhaps even experiencing the early stages of dementia. Facing up to the situation isn’t always easy. They may have spent their whole life being the person who gives advice and support to their family, they may always have been independent and proud.

Accepting the passage of time and that you need care is a difficult step and needs to be handled carefully. For family members, starting the conversation about care needs can be daunting. It can involve a sensitive role-reversal where you are suddenly expected to be the one giving the advice. There’s an understandable anxiety about how your loved one will react and, quite likely, questions about the cost of care.

Putting it off never helps

In 2016, the charity Independent Age commissioned research to investigate attitudes to conversations about care in later life. The study revealed a stark contrast between what we believe and what we do. 82% of the people in the survey said it was fairly or very important to talk to older relatives about ‘where they would like to live if they could no longer live at home’, but just 23% said they had done so.

Perhaps this was just a question of timing in some cases. But, for whatever reason, starting the conversation about care seems to be the hardest part.

Ultimately, your concern will be to ensure that your family member receives the care they need. You’re much more likely to achieve this without a major upset if you are prepared and well-informed.

How to have the conversation

Being an unpaid carer can sometimes leave you feeling exasperated because of a particular event. This is the worst possible time to start the conversation. You also don’t want to produce care home brochures ‘out of the blue,’ with no preparation.

First, you have to change your relative’s perceptions about their need for care and what care might mean. If they don’t accept that they need care or don’t think that their opinions are being respected it’s going to be a struggle to get them to consider anything.

Here are a few suggestions that may help:

Choose the time and the place carefully. Make sure that it’s not a time when either of you is likely to be tired or stressed and that the conversation can take as long as you need. Choose somewhere calm where you won’t be disturbed.
Be well informed. There are many care options including care at home, assisted living and care homes. Make sure you know what all of these entail, including costs.
Find out about possible financial support that might be available and what you need to do to access this.
Consider involving a friend or person that your relative respects so that there is an independent voice in the conversation.

Websites such as Age UK have plenty of useful information about different care options, costs and financial support. You can also contact the team at Altogether Care who will be happy to talk through your options and help you prepare to have the conversation with confidence.

The Modern Way to Deliver Care at Home

Posted on 4 March 2019 by dukadmin

Mobile technology has revolutionised so many aspects of our work and lives. Our home care teams make many visits each day to multiple locations, so mobile technology is the logical way to support the work they do.

The Mobile Care Worker App we recently introduced supports our care teams at all points of service delivery. It means we can forget about completing paper forms and records during visits and focus more time on our care users.

The app guides our staff to each appointment using maps and directions. If there is anything they need to know to gain access, the app will tell them this also.

Once at the appointment, our staff check in automatically using their mobile phone. They can see an up-to-date checklist of the care tasks to be carried out and any other information about the service user that might be relevant. They can also be prompted to check whether medication has been taken and record any details that might help with adapting to the care plan to meet changing care needs.

More Efficient

Mobile Care Worker also helps us organise the care we provide more efficiently. Data is captured instantly from each visit due to staff being able to input information through the app rather than in the office. This means we spend less time entering data from paper forms and more time designing a better service to meet our customers’ needs.

We also spend less time designing visit rosters and can see instantly where all our mobile staff are. If it looks like they might be late for an appointment, we can let people know to reassure them that they haven’t been forgotten. Simpler rostering also makes it easier for us to ensure that people see the same care worker at every visit.

Mobile Care Worker provides another way to involve relatives in the care of their loved one, which can be very welcome if they don’t live locally. They can be given secure access to the system and be reassured that visits have taken place when scheduled. They can also be part of the discussion around designing the most appropriate care programme.

Technology will never take the place of personal interactions in the care delivery, but it can take care of all the things that help those interactions to be more effective.

If you or an elderly relative are starting to find basic household tasks a bit challenging, a care at home service might be just what’s needed to brighten life up. Contact us today on 01305 300161 to find out more or click here.

What Will More Technology in Care Mean for Service Users?

Posted on 23 October 2018 by dukadmin

Like most walks of life, the care sector is experiencing technological change. The pace of change is likely to increase rather than decrease.

For some, more technology and automation conjures up an image of a world where social care becomes dehumanised, where conversations are with computer applications and chatbots rather than people. Or where a friendly robot takes care of domestic duties. We believe the reality will be very different, and much more human.

If we look at the technology we are currently using it actually creates more human interaction rather than less. It enhances personal care rather than replacing it.

Care staff use handheld PDA’s to make sure they have instant access to information about service users, their care plans and personal preferences, wherever they are working. Record keeping and observations such as food and drink intake are made in a few clicks.

Real Time Information and Enhanced Care

Care staff have better information to work with and have to spend less time updating or sharing it. Which leaves more time to talk and to develop relationships. Using real-time information enables the delivery of better-quality care that is more focused on the needs of each individual.

Relatives are able to access information for greater peace of mind and have an involvement in care where relevant.

On a grander scale, technology opens the way to even more advancements in care. Artificial intelligence and machine learning ought to do a better job of predicting and planning care needs within an area. Virtual Reality is already helping to improve wellbeing for dementia patients by allowing them to experience environments they knew from years ago.

Good social care has always been, and will always be, something that has human interaction and relationships at its core. Technology will not change this; it will enhance rather than replace those interactions. It will also bring the entire ‘team around the person’ closer together, which includes care staff, health professionals, family and carers.

For anyone interested in better quality, more personalised care, technology is something to be embraced rather than resisted.

To arrange a visit to one of our care homes to see how we are delivering better quality care focused on individual needs, contact us today on 01305 300 161.

Home Care Services in Southampton – Extending the Altogether Care Family

Posted on 13 September 201822 February 2024 by dukadmin

Care at home is a lifeline for many elderly people. Being able to receive help with tasks such as getting in and out of bed, washing, dressing and housework can make all the difference to people who need some assistive care but want to stay in their own home.

Knowing a trusted home care provider can make all the difference. Altogether Care has an established reputation for providing high quality residential and domiciliary care in Dorset and Somerset. We are driven by helping people to live as independently as possible. Building on this success, we are now able to offer the following care services in the Southampton area:

Personal Care,
Live-in Care,
Getting out and about,
Domestic support,
Sleeping/Waking night care,
Companionship and sitting service

We aim to help people continue to live life as independently as possible, with the reassurance that help is available through pre-arranged visits at times they choose. Just because everyday tasks are becoming a little more difficult, it doesn’t mean that you have to give up your independence.

Extended Services

Staying in your own home might also mean that some help is needed with every day, non-care activities such as DIY, gardening and cleaning. To make life easier for our clients we’ve extended our services to include these tasks. Whatever support you need you can get it from one trusted organisation.

Being an established care provider means that we can carefully select and vet tradespeople who will understand your needs and be ideally suited to helping older people in their own homes.

In launching our Southampton office, we are bringing the same family-run, caring approach that has earned us an excellent reputation for in care for 30 years. If you’d like to find out more, please get in touch with us on 02382 351 800 or visit our Southampton home care services page.

What do CQC Inspection Reports Really Tell You?

Posted on 12 September 2018 by dukadmin

First of all, Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspections are a good thing. It is important that there is accountability so that people placing their trust in care services can have confidence that the system is properly regulated.

Accountability also helps providers with common performance benchmarks and guidance on where we can improve.

To make best use of CQC inspection reports when choosing a care home or home care provider, it can help to understand a bit of background and context. Inspectors report on whether services are safe, effective, caring, responsive and well led. There are four possible ratings: Outstanding, Good, Requires Improvement and Inadequate. There is no category for ‘satisfactory.’

Some of the inspection rating is based on documentation such as procedures and record keeping and some of it is essentially a snapshot of what inspectors saw and who they spoke to. So, there could be some subjectivity in the findings- there’s also potentially some randomness based on exactly when the inspection happened.

There’s no doubt too, that some providers are better at the process of preparing for inspections than others. Although you could argue that this is what you’d expect from a well-managed organisation.

What do Ratings Mean?

Don’t dismiss homes simply if they are not Outstanding or Good. Care providers, and more importantly, care users are highly individual and other factors should also be considered.

For example, a home with a lower rating may be a better choice for an individual if the location makes it easier for relatives to visit and for the resident to maintain links with the community they come from. It may be that the facilities and activities on offer are more in line with what a particular person wants.

Similarly, you shouldn’t necessarily be put off a care home because its CQC rating at its last inspection was ‘Requires Improvement.’ There may not be that much practical difference between a provider that just got over the threshold to be rated ‘Good’ and one that didn’t quite make it.

If a home or provider is said to require improvement, it’s important to understand what this means. It could be that they provide essentially safe and effective care but need to tighten up some of their management processes. Even a provider with an ‘Inadequate’ rating shouldn’t be discounted out of hand if the management is taking urgent and purposeful action to correct the shortcomings found in the inspection.

The best way to identify the most suitable care home is to arrange a visit during a normal day to see for yourself whether residents look happy and well cared for. By all means, take along a copy of the most recent inspection report and talk through any concerns with the manager. More importantly, go with an open mind and ask: ‘is this a place where I or my loved one could live the life they want to live. To arrange a visit at any of our ‘Good’ care homes, contact us today on 01305 300 161.

Myths Exposed: There Are More Good Care Homes than you Might Think

Posted on 8 May 2018 by dukadmin

Bad news always travels faster than good. And it grabs the headlines. Because of high profile stories in the national press you could easily get the impression that good care homes are hard to find. The reality is different, and much more positive.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspects all adult social services providers. Findings are categorised into four levels: outstanding, good, requires improvement and inadequate.

To be rated as good or outstanding, care homes must demonstrate high standards for how they are run, the capabilities of the care team and standards of person-centred care they deliver. Over 80% of residential care homes are rated as good or outstanding.

Smaller Homes Perform Better

The other common perception is that care homes are run by large faceless companies. Some are, most are not. There are thousands of smaller homes that are often family run businesses owned by people take great pride in the standards of care they deliver.

CQC data shows 85 percent of services catering for 1-50 people were rated as good or outstanding, compared with 73 percent of larger services for 101-250 people.

The size of the care or nursing home seems to make a significant difference to the standard of care you could expect to receive.

This is probably because a smaller number of residents makes it easier to shape services around each individual. For example, therapies can be incorporated into care programmes to help individual residents lead fuller lives.

This extends to activities that help residents remain active and engaged; these are essential for promoting physical and emotional wellbeing.

It might also be that in smaller homes we have more time to interact with each individual. We are better able to notice any changes to their state or mind or health and to make changes to their care plan accordingly.

If you are looking for residential care for yourself or a relative the news may be better than you imagine. There are many good care homes and there’s plenty of information available online to help you make the best choice.

How Care Management Software Helps with the Human Touch

Posted on 16 April 2018 by dukadmin

Technology plays an increasing role in social care, as it is in many aspects of life. But good care is still largely about human interactions. The key issue for care management systems and other care technologies is how they support those interactions.

At the end of 2017 we rolled out a new care management system across our homes. When we evaluated the options the important questions were around what the proposed solution would mean for our residents and our team.

Our new real-time mobile care management software brings complete transparency. Care activity reports track delivery against each resident’s digital care plan, including an audit trail for all fluids, nutrition and medicines. Events and inputs are logged as they happen so there is one, constantly updated source of information about the care each resident receives.

Where, for example, nutrition or fluid intake needs to be adjusted the system can automatically calculate and record the required changes. Because all of this happens efficiently there is more time for our care team to interact with residents and ensure we are looking after their overall wellbeing.

Because data is so easy to collect, we can use more of it. Procedures are driven by individual care plans and aligned with CQC standards. This means we have consistent and comprehensive care reporting records for each resident and can reinforce best practice continuously.

External Links

The care management system is intelligent and synchronises with the pharmacy to ensure medications are administered correctly, sourced cost-effectively and always available.

Secure external links are provided so that digital care plans and information can be shared with health professionals to streamline patient care. Family members also have a secure gateway so they can input suggestions to the care plan and see what is happening with the wellbeing and care of their relative.

Benefits

The system helps staff work more efficiently and to deliver better care. There’s more time for carer and resident interaction and more control for the service users and their relatives.

The transparency that comes with realtime care tracking has several advantages:

Relatives can instantly see how we interact with and care for our residents.
Care needs can be more accurately determined and demonstrated.
Greater continuity and consistency of health and care provision is facilitated.
There is hard evidence to support the care and funding needs for each resident.

The technology is helping us to work more efficiently and provide the best care possible. It also gives family members important reassurance that their relatives are being well cared for and encouraged to lead an active and fulfilling life.

Find out more about how we use technology to track and improve the care we deliver.

Social Care Partnerships are About Culture as well as Contracts

Posted on 13 April 2018 by dukadmin

Some challenges are too big to tackle on your own. And taking care of the increasing care needs of an ageing population is probably as big a challenge as you can ask for. But what sort of social care partnerships would be needed to deliver a sustainable solution?

Currently we have too many older people stuck in hospital beds because there is no suitable care they can be transferred to. Either that or the process for commissioning that care doesn’t work as well as it should.

While we have more people needing more complex care outside of hospitals we also have care homes closing. Some owners struggle to meet the demands of CQC standards and the expectations of funders and residents and still make even a modest profit to remain viable and re-invest in the changing needs of clients.

Historically, relationships between health services and local authority commissioners, and the largely private organisations that deliver care have been too ‘insular.’ At the same time financial pressures have led to care commissioning being ‘commoditized’ rather than being planned and delivered in partnership.

Thinking Differently

Whatever structures and systems we put in place they can’t be fully effective unless we also create a different culture; one in which we collaborate openly and make the best use of our collective resources and expertise.

Care homes need the input of health specialists to make sure we provide for all the physical, emotional and mental needs of our residents. Supporting a healthy care sector will also help ease the pressure on hospital beds and speed up the transfer of care to either residential or domiciliary provision.

The more we collaborate and communicate the better we will understand each other’s issues and objectives. This is the vital first step towards finding joint solutions and making better use of everyone’s scarce resources.

For care users there should increasingly be one conversation that leads to the right care and support being provided by the right person at the right time. This won’t just improve quality of life it can also save repeated or emergency hospital admissions that further drain resources and cause distress.

In running our care homes in Dorset and Somerset we always remember that we don’t have the monopoly on good ideas. Our culture is to work collaboratively with a wide range of partners in health services and other organisations to meet the diverse needs of our residents, to help them stay happy and healthy.

Continuity is critical to long term sustainability of the care sector

Posted on 15 February 2018 by dukadmin

In December 2017 the CQC published an interim report based on system reviews of health and care services for older people in six areas. It won’t surprise anyone that the picture that emerges is one of a fragmented service with people working very hard to make things work, in spite of systems and conflicting priorities that don’t always help them.

If and when we implement better systems for assessing care needs and transferring people between health and care providers, the question remains about whether this will be enough. With current funding levels and arrangements will we ever see a joined-up service that consistently delivers on continuity of care?

Right now, continuity of communication, never mind care, can be an issue. Throughout the care service we see short term funding, short term or zero hours contracts, and a workforce with a high turnover of staff. These conditions are largely economically-driven and not ones in which a joined-up service will flourish.

Better software tools are helping. It is becoming easier to capture complex care needs, broker the necessary care packages and ensure full details of the service user and their needs flow through the system.

Disconnects can, however, still occur when the funding for initial care packages runs out. The process of re-assessing needs and brokering suitable care can still take too long. And without long-term funding it is hard for care providers to deliver long-term continuity.

We know that what people want most of all is to see a familiar face. Continuity of care is a very human issue. If funding is interrupted, the familiar care worker may have to be reallocated or may finish the short-term contract they were employed on. If we want to ensure continuity of care, we need continuity of funding.

Funding continuity will help ensure that service users never feel they are telling their story ‘over and over’ to different people and wondering whether anyone ever talks to each other.

The care workforce makes a fantastic effort and achieves so much in difficult circumstances. We need greater certainty over future funding to guarantee that this dedicated support will always be available when we need it.

How Technology Helps Our Care to be More Human

Posted on 19 December 2017 by dukadmin

If you read an article about technology and social care the chances are that you’ll see a vision of the needs of service users being tended to by some kind of robot. All very exciting and entertaining. But missing the basic point that good care is mostly about human interaction.

Technology has instead a real value when it supports those interactions and allows more time for them to happen.

We’ve recently invested significantly in a modern care management system. It’s a mobile platform that is bringing real benefits to our team and to our residents. By taking care of routine admin tasks and ensuring that relevant details such as care plans are always readily available, we are finding that we have more time to interact and concentrate on the wellbeing of those we care for, our residents.

In selecting the software, we had some essential criteria:

It had to be simple to use so it didn’t distract our care staff from interacting with residents.
It had to help our team deliver consistently excellent care against agreed care plans.
It had to help us flag up and track the individual actions and interventions needed for each resident.
Information had to be real time and automated, so we could spend more time understanding what was happening and less time recording it.

The system we chose does all of this and more. Real time reporting ensures there is complete continuity during shift handovers. We also have complete audit trails for medication, liquids, nutrition and activity levels that can highlight any potential issues and suggest alterations to the required care.

The software also brings greater consistency. Procedures are aligned not only to the care plan for each individual resident but also to the CQC standards. This builds a consistent and measurable level of care for everyone. The transparency of this system is not only beneficial for relatives but also our senior managers and experts in care who are able to monitor vital signs and have an instant input when and where it is required.

The technology we’ve invested in also helps us to build a stronger care team around each person, involving families, friends and health service professionals. We’ll talk more about this in another article.

Most importantly the technology saves us time. We are investing the time released in better quality interactions with our residents to help them lead the most active and fulfilling lives possible.

If you’re looking for a care provider for yourself or a loved one, in one of our homes or yours you can find out more by visiting our website or contact us directly on 01305 300 161 to discuss in more detail how we can help you.

A Concise Guide to Direct Payments for Social Care

Posted on 14 December 2017 by dukadmin

Direct Payments are based on the view that you are the best person to decide what care is right for you. We agree that you and your loved ones are the best people to decide what care is right for you. This principle has shaped our care services for nearly 30 years.

Under certain circumstances, instead of your local council choosing your care provider and paying for that care, you can receive money yourself to use with who you choose.

Direct Payments are optional. If you prefer for your council to arrange and pay for care on your behalf that is your choice.

Direct Payments are available to the following people:

Older people who need community care services.
Disabled people over the age of 16.
A parent of a disabled person.
A disabled person who needs help being a parent
A carer or somebody looking after a person who cannot take care of the money themselves.

Before claiming direct payments, you will need an assessment of needs by your local council. You can only buy equipment or help using your Direct Payments if the assessment says you need it. You must keep records of what you spend. Anything you spend on items not included in your assessment may have to be paid back.

What you can buy:

Equipment or help needed so that you or somebody you care for can carry on living at home or leave long-term residential care.
Short-term residential care (if your council agrees).
Employing a helper. This cannot be your husband, wife or a close relative who lives in the same home.

Direct payments cannot be used to buy care from your council or for long-term residential care.

To receive Direct Payments, you will need to prove that you are able to manage the money and spend it on the right things. The amount you get will be sufficient to cover only the care or equipment identified in your assessment of needs. If you would like additional support, you can buy this without it affecting your Direct Payment.

Direct Payments will not affect any benefits you receive such as child support or independent living fund payments. The amount you receive may depend on your income, but payments are not taxable.

We hope this guide will help you understand whether Direct Payments are the best option for you or somebody you care for. You can see an infographic of this guidance here or to find out more about how Altogether Care could help you contact us on 01305 300 161.

Head Office

Some recent day to day activities