Private (visiting) carers

[WhoopItUp]

Does anyone have any experience or organising carers to come in once a day to help out? I have one parent with dementia and the other is struggling to cope, especially in the morning when symptoms are worst. I keep encouraging them to get help in but there’s a lot of resistance. Does anyone know how much this costs or have any advice. They will self-fund. They were offered an NHS package of support 4x a day but I don’t think this is the right thing at this point.
TIA.

The 4 “NHS” visits are very unlikely to be available to them at the moment - I suspect they were part of an NHS/covid funded care package for people leaving hospital. Funded social care is mostly funded by your local council.

As above, call a few private care agencies. Here in the south East agency care is £25-£30 per hour; an individual carer may be less and there are obviously pros and cons for each approach.

You could ask the council for a needs assessment but frankly they are overwhelmed with people who can’t pay for themselves and won’t do anything different to a good private agency.

If your parents are 'comfortably off' then SS would not offer 4 free care visits, as a previous poster said. If you have more than about £23k in savings, you have to pay for care yourself.

Glad to see all the recommendations for Home Instead - that was who I used, they were excellent. We started with 3-4 hours every morning, and I subsequently added an hour in the evening. Good luck OP.

My dad has had Lewy Body Dementia for over 3 years now. We originally started with a Parkinson's diagnosis around 6 years ago. I totally agree with you regarding your situation and your dad being able to do certain things. Look after your dad as a priority (ie get help to give him a break). We had to get overnight help from 10pm-7am for many months last year as dad never slept through the night and as much as my mum was happy to care for him, getting up 18 times a night during one of his bad phases, nearly broke her. What I've learned, sadly, is that nobody cares about the carer. Good luck, it's a very bumpy journey. 💐

Accept the 4 visits for a start. Then agitate for extra hours to relieve the other parent. FIL used to get a personal allowance that covered 8 hours a week to use as he liked so he could attend appointments, go out etc. Getting the personal allowance meant he had it as cash and he could flex from week to week so he might only use a couple of hours one week for shopping but another week he could use more than 8 if he had appointments or wanted to do something. If it was paid direct it was useit or lose it each week. MIL also went to a paid for day centre a couple of days a week, though she wasn't up to it so he didn't always get that break.