Important Things You Should Know about Choosing Home Care

Choosing Care for a Relative is Stressful 

It is, I'm afraid. 

The very thought of having to pay for domiciliary care is something that few of us particularly want to even think about. In the world of marketing, paying for care services is referred to as a distress purchase, something we have to buy but wish we didn’t. For many people, however, the difficulty they experience in finding information is the worst part of looking for home care. Indeed, in 2014 the Care Quality Commission conducted a survey that found choosing care (home care or residential) for a relative was more stressful than buying a house or going through a divorce. Whilst the stress can probably not be eliminated, access to reliable information would certainly ease things.

The challenge of finding reliable information should not come as a shock. Care providers are no different from any other supplier of goods or services. People who sell their expertise – any type of expertise - have always been reluctant to giveaway information. The view has been (and still is) that expertise brings with it membership (almost) of a priesthood. Membership of the priesthood is based on knowledge. This knowledge is granted only to those who are members of the priesthood….

Where Can I Find Information? 

This article deals principally with domiciliary care. Where appropriate, though, I do make reference to residential care. It won’t answer every question, but it will, in many cases, point you in the right direction. The health and social care landscape is not an easy one to view. The danger is that you may find yourself looking at a too expansive panorama whereas what you really need is to identify and focus on just one particular feature of the scene. Too much information is sometimes as bad as too little.

If you are looking for a domiciliary care provider an excellent place to start is homecare.co.uk. You can type your location into its database and you will be given all the homecare providers in that locality. Many of these home care companies will have reviews provided by their customers. There is a companion site for residential care, carehome.co.uk. You will also find some useful articles on both sites.

Age UK has an excellent website, where you will find a quite extensive range of information. There are local Age UK centres, also. There may be one near you. The Age UK website has a facility for you to type in your postcode and find your nearest local centre. If you wish; you can also telephone Age UK.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is a must visit website for anyone researching care companies. The CQC is the body that regulates all health and social care providers in England. Any provider which has been inspected – and most have been inspected by now, unless they are newly formed - will have a report on the CQC’s website. Once you have found a few providers it is a very good idea to see what the CQC has to say about them. There is also a wealth of information to be found on the site.

The United Kingdom Home Care Association (UKHCA) is another site that allows you to search for local home care providers. You may find some useful information here. It is, however, very much oriented towards providers.

I should declare an interest at this point. My blog, Domiciliary Care Matters, has quite a few useful articles about different aspects of home care. I will provide links in this article to other articles on my blog that I think might be worth your while looking at.

Who Pays for My Home Care? 

Social care provided at home is financed by yourself, by social services or partly by social services and partly by yourself. To qualify for social services support there are two tests: a needs assessment and a means test. Under normal circumstances, you will be entitled to a care needs assessment. If you are assessed as having an eligible need; you will then be required to have a means test. This is an assessment of your ability to pay. The test measures your savings and your income. At the moment, your home is not included in the assessment (it is for residential care). You may recall the controversy that was sparked during the this year’s (2017) election campaign when the Conservatives proposed that your home should be included as part of the financial assessment.

If you qualify for social services support you will be awarded a personal budget. You have a choice over who provides your care. You can leave things to social services or you can request a direct payment .and sort out your own home care.

How Much Can I Expect to Pay? 

If you are fully funded through social services you may not have to pay anything. If you decide to have a direct payment and have home care through a private provider you may have to top up. If you pay for home care yourself, the amount you pay will vary depending on where you are in the country, and what your provider charges. The UKHCA estimate that the minimum cost of delivering one hour of home care is currently £20.69. 

 Can I Choose the Times of My Calls? 

This is probably the single most important issue for people having home care. If you are paying for your care and you want a call at, say, 8.00 AM, surely you can have that, can’t you? Surely it is your choice to have a call at a time you want it? Surely, home care providers will be happy to give you what you want? Sadly, it’s not quite so simple.

It may appear to be a very simple thing; yet it is the most difficult thing to accomplish. The difficulty is easy to explain; perhaps a little hard to accept when it affects you. Let’s say that you want a call at 8.00 AM. You contact a home care provider who has 20 people available for 8.00 AM calls, but you will be customer number 21.

You can, of course, try an alternative provider. You may be lucky; you may not. The reality is that in the country as a whole there are only so many carers available for 8.00 AM calls, and you can be next door to certain that there are more people who require care at 8.00 AM.

What Questions Should I Ask a Home Care Provider? 

I won’t attempt to give you an exhaustive list of questions. I’m sure you will think of things I don’t mention.

You should certainly look at the provider’s CQC report. There may be a few questions that reading the report will suggest to you. Bear in mind that things do change. Criticisms in the report may well have been put right. Equally, what was once very good may no longer be so.

Ask about continuity of care. Does the provider aim to give you regular carers? There will always be challenges, but a good provider should aim to give you regular carers – if that is what you want.

How does the provider deal with missed calls? No matter how sophisticated the provider’s systems are; there will be times when the world conspires to make things difficult. If your carer does not turn up; how will the provider deal with it.

What capacity does the provider have to deal with carer illness, holidays and unforeseen demands placed on its services?

Why not ask if the provider is happy for you to be put in touch with one or two of its customers who would be happy to act as referees?

I Still Don’t Feel Part of the Priesthood 

It would take an article the closer to the length of War and Peace to provide you with the information needed. However, if you have any questions I and my team are happy to answer them.

Garry Costain is the Managing Director of Caremark Thanet, a domiciliary care provider with offices in Margate, Kent. Caremark Thanet provides home care services throughout the Isle of Thanet. Garry can be contacted on 01843 235910 or email garry.costain@caremark.co.uk. You can also visit Caremark Thanet's website at www.caremark.co.uk/thanet.