Latest News from Everycare
Tax rises to cover the cost of caring for elderly and disabled people are being considered by the Welsh Government. The money raised could be spent on abolishing care fees or on a pay rise for care workers. A consultation on possible reforms to social care is due to start this summer.
Health Minister Vaughan Gething is set to call for “honesty” and a “grown-up debate” about increasing care costs. But the idea of raising income tax is likely to prove contentious in the run-up to the Welsh elections next year. Social care is under pressure across the UK from a squeeze on funding, an ageing population and high staff turnover. The state spends about £1.2bn on adult social care every year in Wales.
But in a statement to AMs on Tuesday Mr Gething will say the cost is predicted to grow between £30m and £300m by 2023. If the government wants “to seriously improve the quality and the reach of care, then it will require more funding”, he told BBC Wales.
For more on this story visit the BBC Wales website
Allied Healthcare at risk of collapse leaving thousands of elderly people on alert.
Allied Healthcare could cease to operate at the end of the month, the Care Quality Commission has said and there is a ‘credible risk’ services could be disrupted.
Thousands of elderly people were put on alert yesterday amid warnings one of the country’s leading care firms is at risk of collapse.
The Care Quality Commission sounded the alarm after saying Allied Healthcare could cease to operate at the end of this month.
It said there was a “credible risk” that services could be “disrupted” if the company collapsed. Allied Heathcare provides home care – help with washing, feeding and dressing – for 9,300 people in 84 councils across England. The company, which has been struggling with debts, employs 8,000 people. Councils have a duty by law to continue to provide care if a private firm goes bust.
For more on this story visit the Daily Mirror Website.
Everycare home care and live in care services can enable people to stay at home during the most challenging period of their lives.
Doctors are being encouraged to discuss people’s end of life choices much earlier with them and part of this discussion will involve where and how people spend their final days.
Doctors need to get better at having difficult conversations with dying patients and not just in their final days, according to a report from the Royal College of Physicians.
It says doctors should talk to people who could die within 12 months, who may be frail or terminally ill, and give them choices over their future care. But the report says that rarely happens and doctors should be more proactive.It recommends involving family, friends and carers in the conversation too.
The report, Talking about dying, gathered the views of patients, trainees and doctors on how to begin conversations about the end of someone’s life. To read more about this story visit the BBC website.
To find out more about Everycare home care and live in care services and how they can help you stay at home.
People with dementia are being given the opportunity to lead and manage research into the disease, with the help of £700,000 from the National Lottery.
The ground-breaking new project Dementia Enquirers will give people with dementia the chance to undertake their own research into the condition, rather than just being participants. The project will work with DEEP, a UK-wide network of more than a hundred community groups and Innovations in Dementia. They will be able to identify research priorities and plan and carry out their own research.
It envisages using university researchers as advisors or with specified roles within the projects. People involved in DEEP will be supported and trained to capture and share their findings in a creative way such as through film, music, poetry and photography.
Rachael Litherland, director of Innovations in Dementia, said: “We are so proud to have been awarded this National Lottery grant, and excited to be undertaking such ground-breaking work. We are confident that the project can influence the prevailing approaches in research – while bringing new respect for the skills, expertise and resilience of those who are living with dementia.”
Joe Ferns, UK funding director at the Big Lottery Fund, said: “We’re delighted to be funding this project, which puts people with experience of living with dementia at the heart of research into the condition. Thanks to National Lottery players, this important issue is being tackled in a way which helps people to feel more in control of their lives.”
For more information visit the Homecare website
