Live-in carers

[Whattheheckcarer]

We are having a problem finding live-in carers - could anyone please recommend?

Unless you’re paying for a live-in nurse there will be a limit as to what a career will do. You also need to bear in mind that they can’t cover 24/7 x 7 days a week either.
We paid for a live-in carer to help when MIL was dying, to help my SIL, me and the grand daughters cover day and night.

Can the people who didn't get on with Home Instead please.pm what location they are in?

I was going to say what @HotelNotPortofino has said - try and tap into the local network of carers.

This has been a lifesaver for us - not only did we find the couple who now live in and do most of the caring, they have been able to call on their connections for more people to come in during the day as the need for assistance has grown.

We've had great care for a number of years from Elder. www.elder.org

I'm a bit hesitant to recommend them because it's only as good as the carer you end up with. I think we've been really lucky, we've had the same few reliable carers on rotation. I guess some people won't be so lucky. It's not cheap though.

@Whattheheckcarer

Can the people who didn't get on with Home Instead please.pm what location they are in?

It doesn't make any difference @Whattheheckcarer because as @User562377 says of a different agency:

I'm a bit hesitant to recommend them because it's only as good as the carer you end up with.

Like I said above, any agency is very much hit and miss because it is about the quality of the staff that are rota-d to you and are coming to your home. there are alot of very poor standard of workers in the sector - people who just don't care (in the not interested sense of that word).

and your exposure to the number of different carers depends on how much care you need. So generally from what I've seen any client will have at least two carers even if just one call a week so there is cover for time off and rota changes. As you can imagine if you need 24/ 7 live in care 7 days a week, depending on how you are managing that, you will probably be dealing with at at absolute minimum 4 carers - 2 for day two for night but realistically more likely far more than that. So say if you are regularly dealing with 6 carers - the chances of all 6 carers from any agency being really good or even acceptably competent and kind is actually very low. One out of 6? possible if you are lucky.

This is the issue - all agencies will have some good carers and a large proportion of ok but not great, and really not great carers. You have very little control over this and if you try to exert any control the agencies aren't really interested in my experience. this itself can be a test of the agencies - I had such bad experiences, I told a new agency that I wanted to personally meet anyone they were proposing to send as a 'meet and greet' before they started. I was told this would be fine - I think it was just a lie to get me to sign up to a money making contract for them. when it came to it, they became very resistant and ended up saying they had no availablility. I think it was rubbish just to get rid of a potential client who wasn't going to accept crap carers.

I disagree - a local manager with lower standards will impact on both quality of staff taken on and efficiency of team.

We looked into this but so expensive to have 2 x 12 hours carers

We’ve used Guardian Angels and has some lovely live-in carers

It's a lot harder now to find live-in carers. Before BREXIT a friend who needs them used to get younger people (usually 20-somethings) from European countries who had excellent English and would happily come and be a live-in carer for 3 months whilst they saved up money and would then go travelling. Even though the wages are low they could save a lot as their accommodation and food is provided and they can barely go out whilst caring so little opportunity to spend money. But the care agency still had to provide another carer for 3 hours every morning to do wake up, wash, dress and breakfast as that's when the live-in carer had their break, plus one day off a week. And that's with no expectation of night-time care (emergencies only) otherwise they'd have needed two carers on rotation.

You can make it easier if you don't need a carer who drives eg they can accompany to medical appointments
but don't need to drive there as that widens the pool of applicants. Do they need to do shopping or could the supermarket deliver?

It's still quite onerous though - there was a new carer to train up at least every 3 months. Things like cooking skills varied hugely (one wanted all food bought ready prepared which is far more expensive) and there would be mismatches in expectation eg carer quite happy to have one meal a day whereas person being cared for wants 3 meals plus snacks!

Before BREXIT a friend who needs them used to get younger people (usually 20-somethings) from European countries who had excellent English and would happily come and be a live-in carer for 3 months whilst they saved up money and would then go travelling.

It depends on what your caring needs are but if you need anything other than very basic social care - meals cooked and help with dressing say - a 20 something who wants to do it for 3 months and has minimal training is exactly what you dont need.

Anything involving manual handling or moving, cleaning and personal care in bed or assisted while standing, medical needs and so forth is a job that requires skill, proper training and experience. Moving people if not done correctly can cause severe injuries including dislocated shoulders and that is just one example.

But that's the point? They all had training in manual handling etc before they started (bearing in mind to use a hoist requires two carers present) and would often do multiple 3 month stints with gaps inbetween for travel or to save up for university study. A plentiful supply of people who this worked for meant most of them were pretty good, with occasional disasters. And working in 3 month blocks meant they weren't jaded.

Now the supply has dried up and there's very very few people with experience and the right skills who are also in the circumstances where being a live-in carer is feasible. It's incompatible with having your own family or even living in a relationship with someone else. Which rules out a large number of people.

@EmotionalBlackmail
totally agree. Every word.

the two women that ran the agency that cared for DM, both were single, no kids. In their 40s. Strong faith. European. Amazing people. I shall be forever grateful 🙏

They both said how hard Brexit had made things for them.

We used Helping Hands which covered the whole of the UK. This was around 5-6 years ago though so I don't know the impact of Brexit on their staffing levels.

There are likely to be local agencies in your area which offer this though . My friend works as a live-in carer and is registered with a few different agencies.

My understanding around hours of working for home carers is that there is the expectation that the carer will get a full night's sleep - so if night care is needed this requires another carer and a whole other level of expense and complication . Then they get two hours free time in the day - and it depends on the person being looked after whether they are able to be left for this time, or whether the agency will need to provide relief carers (if you use an agency which just does live in you could source these yourself from a separate agency).

I don't see the driving as being a big issue now that there are so many taxi drivers / Uber around . I provided a float for expenses such as taxi rides and my friend does this also .

Driving will be area dependent. Uber isn't available everywhere and some places, particularly more rural, only have limited taxi availability.

I know in my area you cannot get a taxi for some of the morning and a chunk of the afternoon as they're all pre-booked for schoolruns.

You don't even have to be that rural for taxis to be functionally non existent. We're 5 miles from central Reading - can't get a taxi to collect us from home, although I can pick up taxis from the station. And Uber - what's that?

Ah OK - yes I suppose that's true re taxis if you are rural . I am surprised it's so difficult such a short distance from Reading though. We must be very lucky .