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In Guildford only 600 carers were registered with a GP despite census figures indicating that there are more than 18,000 carers in the local area. Local carers successfully campaigned to get a carer recognition worker employed. The worker helps practice staff promote carers’ leaflets, emergency cards and posters, and supports district nurses, health visitors and school nurses to make sure they have the right information to pass on to carers. She makes sure that information is available in different formats– she is working with one surgery to develop an online carers’ forum.
Read more about how carers in Guildford successful campaigning to get GPs on side. more...
Carers in Leeds successfully campaigned for a Carers Champion to be appointed by the Primary Care Trust. She has now been given responsibility for carers’ issues across the PCT and is jointly chairing the Strategy Group that allocates the Carers Grant. She has already had an impact –more GPs have been encouraged to offer carers an annual health check to enable them to continue caring. David Proudlove, Chair of Carers UK Leeds says its made a real difference because the champion “is serious about carers and doesn’t just pay them lip service.”
Read David's tips for getting a health champion in your area. more...
Carers Lewisham are running a project with University Hospital Lewisham to raise awareness of carers in hospital. They have developed a 'Carers Charter' in partnership with the hospital, which summarises how carers can expect to be treated by staff.
Carers Lewisham have also produced a simple self-referral card for professionals to hand out to carers, and support them with easy- to-remember training called the 3 R’s – ‘Recognise, Record and Refer’. This is backed up with banners and leaflets around the hospital advertising Carers Lewisham so that carers can get in touch.
At St Thomas’s Hospital, in South London there is a named Discharge co-ordinator, a nurse, who oversees the discharge and makes sure that carers are properly involved and supported throughout the process. The co-ordinator visits the carer at home in the important weeks after the person is discharged and the carers is therefore very vulnerable and stays in constant contact so that if anything happens or the carer is unable to cope the nurse can help. more...
People don’t see their needs as neatly dividing into health problems and social care problems. Recognising this, Sedgefield PCT, Borough Council and Durham County Council Social Services have established teams of nurses, social workers, housing support officers, business support officers and occupational therapists who work closely together in the same premises.
Involving carers in developing the service
The PCT and councils were determined to involve carers and the public heavily in developing their plans and established a public consultation group early on to get people’s views on the proposals and factors that were important to patients. That group is still in operation and continues to provide comments and feedback.
This scheme is really benefiting carers. On one occasion the district nurse was called out to visit to an elderly woman caring for her husband who had Parkinson’s Disease. The couple lived in unsuitable housing in a poorly lit area. The nurse was able to sort out the woman’s health problems, her husband’s medication and get them prioritised on the housing list and provide information about benefits in 15 minutes.
Carer perspective
John Billington carers for his elderly mother. He is a member of the Patient Public Involvement Forum, and the Learning Disabilities Partnership Board. He has been involved in the development of the integrated team since the early stages. John acts as an advocate for the scheme and gives presentations at conferences about the improvements which have resulted for patients and carers in the local area. He says he sees the model as being as a "stepping stone' in the County to enable all the localities to produce better things for users and carers."
He reflects on the factors behind for their success: "Everyone here talks to each other. The senior members of the Borough Council, Social Services and the [former] PCT have always kept me abreast of what was happening and in terms that I could understand. They have always treated me as an equal."
For more information about the model. more...
Page Last Modified: 21/04/2008
