For many, the terminology around things like care needs assessments and the differences between visiting care, domiciliary care and live-in care can cause real concerns about the right way to implement care without understanding what this all means.
Care assessments are best explained as the first step to arranging the support you and your family need. The Guardian Angel Carers teams around the country offer a no-obligation, free assessment, beginning either with a friendly chat with our knowledgeable care managers at our offices, or finding a good time for us to come to you.
How Can I Find a Great Local Care Agency to Help With Home Care?
Getting the help you need is essential, and if you find the thought of making important decisions about home care difficult, we’re here to make that process easier, less pressured, and to offer support to ensure you have clarity about all the options.
Our free care assessments are designed to ensure anyone searching for a reputable, compassionate care agency receives the assistance they require. You can speak to someone who’ll take the time to discuss all the health concerns, mobility challenges, cognitive issues, or practical tasks that require assistance from a carer.
What Are the Steps to Organise At-Home Care Support?
Guardian Angel Carers has a straightforward process, which works like this:
1. Contact your nearest Guardian Angel Carers team – you can find all the details of our locally owned and managed franchises through our location pages and can get in touch via phone or email.
2. Book a free care assessment at your home or our offices. Our care managers will run through a detailed appraisal, which helps us provide recommendations about the type of care that would be most beneficial and suggest the amount of care support that you or your loved one may need.
3. Decide when you’d like care to start. We’ll ensure your care arrangements begin as quickly as possible and continually review this while staying in close contact with care recipients and their families to make changes as and when needed.
Care assessments are completely tailored to you, and as a private home care provider, we’re entirely independent, so means testing doesn’t apply and we’ll only offer advice based on your needs, wishes and priorities.
What Happens During a Local Care Assessment?
The main aim of a care assessment is to build a picture of the welfare, health and concerns of the person requiring care. We’ll talk about the reasons you’re looking for care, who the support is for, the types of tasks, practical assistance and personal care the person needs, and which aspects of life the individual is finding difficult. As a few examples to illustrate the importance of care assessments:
- For some families, an older relative may be experiencing frailty and find it hard to keep up with household chores. Having someone to pop in each day or a few times a week to cook fresh meals, manage grocery shopping, and help with housekeeping can be an enormous relief.
- Others may need companionship care to keep isolation at bay and assist with social interactions and days out.
- Another care recipient may need personal care to help with washing and dressing, assistance taking medications and completing therapies, or ongoing visiting or overnight care for more involved care support needs.
One of the most common scenarios in which home care becomes more urgent is when a person is due to be discharged from the hospital after an illness or injury and needs to have the right support structure in place at home before they’re allowed to return.
Many healthcare professionals will not discharge someone even if they are medically fit if they know the person won’t be able to self-manage their recovery or rehabilitation, especially if they live alone. This is where having immediate access to personalised care assessments without any means testing can make a profound difference.
Can I Book a Care Needs Assessment Through My Local Council?
Anybody can contact their local council or adult social care services department. They are obligated to offer cost-free care needs assessments, irrespective of whether you believe you are entitled to free or subsidised care or qualify for benefits to help with care costs.
Waiting times vary considerably, and most councils will ‘rate’ the urgency of your care needs. Unfortunately, they often have limited resources and will prioritise families with a critical need for care, or who are dealing with a change in circumstances that is regarded as an emergency.
Care needs assessments with social services representatives should cover a similar scope of areas as a private assessment. We would, though, recommend compiling a list of points or concerns you wish to discuss, as this will directly influence the assistance you receive and the evaluation of your needs. That should include:
- How often you or your loved one needs someone to help them with essential daily tasks such as dressing, preparing food and washing.
- The tasks you need help to complete on a regular basis, such as climbing stairs, shopping for groceries, cleaning and taking medication.
- The impact of a lack of care on your welfare, both physical and mental, and other effects, such as being unable to visit loved ones or a place of worship.
If you’re waiting for a care assessment or have found that these are subject to lengthy delays in your area, you are welcome to contact your closest Guardian Angel Carers office, and we’ll be happy to arrange an assessment as soon as possible.
In the meantime, we’d suggest families looking for a quality local care agency, unsure of the type or frequency of care that would prove most helpful or concerned about the right ways to get a support structure in place, can also find more details about the different types of care via our online guides.