Temporary carers for DM in her own home

[Tadpole10]

My DM is 72 and normally fully independent in her own home.

She's fallen and is currently on crutches. She's had a stay in hospital and is now out and been staying with relatives who have downstairs bathrooms. She can manage to walk on crutches short distances at home but absolutely no chance with stairs.

We are trying to get her back into her own home but it only has upstairs bathroom. There is a front sitting room which can be turned into a bedroom and we have a suitable single bed we can put there.

We need a commode and also some professional carers to manage the commode emptying and hygiene and personal care (washing herself- she can get herself on and off the loo).

Please would anyone with experience of this kind of thing advise- how can we get a commode, and best way to sort out the carers needed? And anything else we haven't thought of?

Thank you

Contact your local adult care real-time social services they will be able to help with sorting out funding, equipment and funding (assessing if your mum pays the full carers bill by herself or contributes to a small part of it)
Depending on area they may have in house teams that support with rehab in situations like this for a short term

Your local office of British Red Cross should be able to advise some temporary help, they do equipment loans and some have ‘back to home’ volunteers who will visit and do bits of shopping and pick up prescriptions etc. They are not trained carers, though so not personal care.)
https://www.redcross.org.uk/get-help/get-support-at-home

Fabulous thank you. She's already on PIP and had a motability car I bet she would be eligible for social care help.

The hospital should not have discharged your Mum without first assessing her needs
Hospital should provide 4 weeks care support on discharge. Contact hospital and request an assessment. OR contact PALS at the hospital Mum was in. This is an unsafe and unacceptable discharge.
PS: I am a Registered Nurse

The fall happened in a holiday cottage in Wales, she was in hospital there for 2 nights and I have transported her back home to England now and they told her to contact her own GP now we are back. She had phoned her GP, couldn't get through and so has emailed to inform and ask for help and another X-ray on her knee.

Should we request an assessment from her local hospital back in England?

You need intermediate care and an occupational therapist I think. Probably physio too. She should get a four-week package after discharge before you need to arrange too much yourself.

Depending on how she's hurt, can she go upstairs sitting down and pushing up one step at a time? Hope she's back on her feet soon!

We did the- get upstairs on your bum one step at a time thing- at my sisters house to get my mum a shower. She did make it up and down out only with a lot of hoisting from people to get her back upright and in the crutches after she had been on her bum.

@Froniga or anyone, do you know how we could get the 4 week aftercare thing activated, from our local NHS healthcare providers, even though the hospital stay was in Wales? DM is in north west England.

For now I've told her to ask her GP about it.

Curam care have a data base of self employed carers try them

i believe stairlifts can be rented for short term use. They leave surprisingly few holes after uninstalling them

Great idea thank you

A preowned stairlift with a 180 degree bend cist us £3000 earlier this year. A straight staircase would be less.

NHS gave Mum a 6 week return to home package with carers up to 4 times daily.
Private carers near her are £30/hr.

I would contact her local reablement team, they can assess her and provide equipment. Her gp practice may also gave a frailty or elderly care team who can come and assess her.