father is now incontinent - my mum needs help

[CatMarwood]

My father has already been diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment but having recently had a stroke this seems to have pushed him into the next stage.
He came home from hospital yesterday and although seems generally much recovered from the stroke is rather confused and now incontinent. Day time is not so bad but my mother who is not the strongest was up at 6.am having to wash bed sheets and I am concerned she will burn herself out. This is all very new for us and I am going to see what other products are available to help. He already wears pads and has bed pads but this is not sufficient. I have looked up mattress protection but it seems these are not absorbent in any way but just protect the mattress. I can't find advice as to the best products. Having looked on ageuk where they seem quite expensive compared to something similar at argos I could do with advice on what to get. Any ideas please.

You can get from the surgery/district nurse a stick on night catheter which attaches to a urine bag and will catch all the urine through the night then you can throw the catheter away and re apply a new one each night - I'm a support worker and am so grateful for these products!! Only thing is it will need to be attached to his private area each night which family may not want to do as it's a bit of an invasion on privacy!

Is your Dad eligible for help? I'm sure you'd be able to get home care to help get him washed and dressed or at least promote his independence. They're also able to change bedding and make up beds so that your Mum does not have to worry about it! I think this is quite important to consider as your Mum is not getting any younger and if she is burnt out, who is going to look after your Dad? Try and get something sorted. I'm sure council would also be able to fund it. Not certain how it works but definitely get in touch with Age UK (or similar). Take care.

Call his g.p. or practice nurse, ask them to visit and make a referral to the continence service and continence nurse. Tena extra pants were good but they are expensive, like a pp said call the social services and ask for a home assessment, he is entitled to this and your mum is entitled to a carers assessment.. A urine bottle offered during the day and before bed would help, maybe a commode, this is something the district nurses can help organise. You can buy pads in wilko and all supermarkets. Your dad may qualify for attendance allowance and your mum carers allowance, this could help pay for a morning and bedtime carer if they don't qualify for council funded care.

Thank you for all your advice. He does have someone coming in to help with homecare and I will suggest my mum asks for help with changing the bed. We are so new to this and my parents used to being such independent people it's going to challenging asking for the right help! Can homecare be used to allow my mum go get out the house even for 30 mins and if not is there another service where she can get someone to sit with him?
The continence services have now been and have given my mum a form to fill in monitoring things for the next three days so I hope they will offer more help following this.

I would second the idea of a convene catheter but they do not stay on for some men and also for people with confusion, they can fiddle with them/pull them off. If he is being monitored for 3 days they will obviously make suggestionsbased on that.
See if you have some sort of Carer support charity locally who can support your mum emotionally. They will also no all the options for respite sitting services to give the carer a break.

Your mum can go out when the carers are there, they might offer a sitting service as well. Look online to see if there is a carers support network near them, Age UK and Carers UK may also be able to help. Your mum needs to look after herself too, it's hard work looking after someone. Would they consider a call alarm, falls mat by the bed. Ask the g.p. or social services to arrange a home visit from the occupational therapist.

it's also not necessary to have a catheter at this stage.

just look up your local continence service on your nhs trust website - you can self refer - you should get pads or pull ups for him which will help enormously

@CatMarwood yes there is. The company I used to work for used to do sit in's while the carer goes out to run errands / has a break. I also believe Age UK have volunteers who can provide this service for free if you are not eligible for funding or if you cannot afford it.

Convenes are great if he will tolerate it. It's not a proper Cather just a sheath that catches the urine and goes into a bag.