If your lo has dementia and is in a care facility, how much is it costing per week.

[TheSummerGrinch]

I know it all depends the area etc.

Mum has Alzheimer's, 7 years in to it now.

She wasn't doing too badly, she lives at home with dad and between my sister and I and a morning carer we were doing ok. Mum was (mainly) continent and went to a day centre twice a week. Things were stressful as they are with dementia but ok.

However, that all changed 6 weeks ago. Mum fell in the garden breaking her hand, dislocating her knee and fracturing her neck. Although mum is ok now with her physical injuries the 3 week stay in hospital has exacerbated her dementia. They allowed her to toilet in the bed and now she is double incontinent.

She came home two weeks ago. She is still often double incontinent although the carers are able to get her on the commode or toilet. They can also get her walking with support and a frame but she is still very weak (she also has osteoporosis and breast cancer). Our carers are wonderful but it's hard going.

We have 6 carers working on a rota 4 times a day but it's very expensive and it still leaves 20 hours a day where mum is either in mine, my sister's or my elderly father's care. We are exhausted and miserable.

We never wanted to put mum in care, no one does but I can't help thinking for maybe not much more than we are paying for the carers to come 4 hours a day we could have mum looked after 24/7 and gain some life back for ourselves?

Tbh, I hate to even contemplate it, I hate the thought of her in care but I'm done. Going to my parents on an almost daily basis has wiped me out.

How much do you pay for a care home privately?

We got away with residential care rather than nursing care. It was only £4k a month. (Increased 400% in the decade he was there).

Dad was mobile, independent for feeding and toileting until the last 6m when he needed pads and in his last 2w he needed full care which the home were able to deliver, supposed by district nursing.

4.5k a month so roughly £1125 a week

Can I ask - apologies if someone has said - but what does lo in the title stand for?

Have you got a lasting power of attorney in place too? Has you mum still got capacity? Get that sorted asap if you haven't and she still has capacity. Makes things much easier.

I think it’s Loved One (I confuse it with Little One).

@Truetoself we have 18 months left of my Nan's assets to pay for her home. The money that my grandad died earning as a miner and he worked so bloody hard to provide for her. The money they already paid tax on. It's utterly shit. But what other choice do we have? We can't care for her with her needs. I work 40 hours a week with two children under 5 and can barely afford to pay my own bills. I can't give her the care she needs.

Fuck knows what will happen in 18 months when the money runs out. I can't think about it.

As someone who has a parent with early dementia, can I please ask how this is actually funded? I earn a fraction of the cost of care. In terms of financial logistics, how does this work?

It is shit isn’t it. My brother worked all his life and I have sold his house - he has enough to keep him in the home for several more years - been there for 3 now - I do hope they will allow him to stay when the money runs out. Those who are self-funding pay more for their care than those funded by the local authority in the same care home.

If you get a social services assessment you may find she only has to pay the minimum. We have recently done similar, it’s horrendous but mum dementia is really bad now . We pay approx £1000 a month. You can’t carry on as you are and the relief and release from the worry and constant calls is amazing

You are not liable to pay if they need residential care - it is based on their assets - savings/ house sale etc. My brother gets full attendance allowance of around £400 pm which is not means tested. If they do not have assets you may find that your Local Authority will not pay the fees for some of the more expensive care homes.

If your parent has less than @£14k the LA will fund but there is likely to be a contribution from income. Above that up to @£23k there will be a contribution from income and savings. Above that it's funded from their savings. If there is a spouse/civil partner living in the house it will be disregarded for the financial assessment.
Putting assets in trust or otherwise disposing of them can appear attractive but as well as reducing (possibly even eliminating) choice of which care home it also removes the choice of when. An LA will only fund once someone can't manage/isn't safe with 4 care visits a day and that assessment bar is very high to cross and can leave someone frightened and lonely for 20+ out of 24 hours.

At the moment we’re paying about £350 a week (so all her pensions less £26 per week pocket money).

All the money has been spent on care over the last 10 years so she’s mainly social services funded now.

Continuing care doesn't apply to dementia conditions, she may be eligible due to her breast cancer, but unlikely if that's not the primary cause of her needs.

Exactly, and you don't have to sell their home whilst they are still alive, the council should offer a DPA (deferred payment agreement) the house can then be rented out, stand dormant or be sold in a calm fashion - once the person has died and their estate settled the DPA is paid off when the house sells.

I actually have no idea. They used my mums NHS pension (which to be fair was probably no more than about £800 a month) and the rest was funded between Social Services and the NHS.

We haven't had any luck with adult SS either. Age UK and Alzheimer's society (and the Admiral nurses) have been great.

This is said with much kindness but you will have to let this thinking go..
My Mum was cared for so well when we were unable to..
She went in with a beautiful wardrobe and always took pride in her grooming..
But unfortunately Alzheimer's took more of a hold and I silently laughed at her dressing choices and seeing other residents in her shrunken cashmere..
The staff did there absolute best and I only thank them for their care not only of Mum but of us as a family..
Mum died just before Christmas and I often look at photos of her in something that she loved and wonder/hope someone else is enjoying it now..
Again said with kindness..

Sadly mum no longer has capacity. We arranged full POA's as soon as mum was diagnosed 7 years ago.

In the UK children aren’t obliged to pay for parents care. The person needing care pays with any savings / property / income / assets that they have then failing that, the tax payer pays. There are lots of qualifiers, but that’s the basics.

We've been down the SS route, several times. They aren't at all helpful once they discover my parents have well over the threshold of savings. Sadly, my parents will need to fully fund mum's care (obviously minus AA and Pensions etc).

Its amazing how adult SS routinely "forget" to properly advise people of their legal rights in regards to property disregards etc as given in the care act.

Its not that complicated and can be succinctly summarised in a side of A4!

That sounds incredibly hard. I’m just a random on an Internet forum but I wholeheartedly give you whatever permission you need to stop doing this. This must be having at terrible impact on you three. We had a very similar scenario with MIL and she didn’t even come home from the hospital, she went directly into residential nursing care. Double incontinence, dementia and advanced lack of mobility needs specialist care and equipment, and a round the clock team. You need to step back from the hands-on care and be a daughter again.

Do you or your dad have POA for your mum?

Assuming your parents have cash assets well over the threshold then alas it will be on them, remember the cash is divided 50/50 with the spouse so they can only count half and the house will be entirely disregarded if a qualifying person lives there (ie spouse).

Thank you. In all honesty we should have had mum placed into care when she was discharged from hospital. She really went downhill in there and we genuinely thought she just needed to get back to familiar surroundings but the fall and the hospital stay has done irreversible damage.

But we live in hope and will give the home care anther couple of weeks but I am naturally a pessimistic realist (Dad and dsis are the optimists) so I remain doubtful it will work out so will start the process of ringing local care homes to get an idea of costs etc and then will need to start visiting.

We do all have full POA's, they were put in place from the very beginning.

Yes, dad has a financial adviser so everything on his side is looked after and we have been spending all of mum's care fees etc from her accounts not dad's.

The majority of their money has come from inheritance as they were both only children. They were too scared to spend any of it and have some fun in case either of them needed care, obviously that day has now arrived. A bit sad really but sensible nonetheless.