How to Choose the Right Care Service: A Guide for Families
When faced with the task of seeking care for a loved one, many people feel overwhelmed, under-informed or simply unsure where to begin. Our informative guide will help you to understand the options available, and feel better equipped to choose the right care service to suit your family’s needs and circumstances.
The importance of choosing the right care service
Good care is person-centred, meaning that it is tailored to the unique care requirements of each individual, rather than being a ‘one-size-fits-all’ solution. Choosing the right care service for your loved one will ensure that they receive the type, level and frequency of care that they need, to live the life they choose.
Types of care services
Broadly speaking, there are two overarching categories of care – expert support provided by carers who visit the individual in their own home, and specialist care delivered within a dedicated care setting such as a care home or nursing home. Let’s consider each of these options in more detail.
Home care – support in an individual’s own home
Home care visits can be incredibly helpful in supporting an individual to remain as independent as possible in their own home, and can cover:
- Housework and grocery shopping;
- Personal care and meal preparation;
- Medication management and attending appointments;
- Companionship and wellbeing checks.
Home care can often be the first step on an individual’s care journey, providing light support with daily tasks and helping to relieve family anxieties around their safety and wellbeing at home.
Day care and respite breaks – temporary support in a care home
Day care and respite breaks provide a temporary care solution to meet specific needs – either as an add-on to home care, or as a care solution in their own right. Both offer the full range of benefits experienced by long-term care home residents, over a shorter period of time. These include:
- Company and companionship;
- Home-cooked meals;
- Activities and entertainment;
- Tailored care and support.
Whether for a day, a week or longer, these temporary or ad hoc care solutions can provide ‘cover’ for family carers, additional support following illness or injury, or an opportunity to ‘try out’ a care home when planning for the future.
Care homes – long-term residential care in a dedicated care setting
Care homes cater for the long-term care and support of full-time residents, tailored to individual needs. This includes round-the-clock expert care, all meals, housework and utilities, full use of all the home’s facilities, and the opportunity to participate in the activities and entertainment on offer for the home’s resident community.
There are three main types of care homes:
- Residential care homes: suitable for those who need support with daily tasks or personal care, and who are looking for the peace of mind that comes with knowing support is always at hand;
- Dementia care homes: suitable for those who are living with dementia, and need a safe and stimulating environment in which they can live well;
- Nursing care homes: suitable for those living with long-term or complex medical conditions, who would benefit from receiving 24/7 hospital-standard nursing care, in a more homely environment.
When considering care homes of any type, it is always advisable to book a guided tour to view and experience the home first-hand, meet the care team, and ask any questions you may have about the care, environment or facilities. This will help you to understand if the care home is a good fit for your loved one.
Assessing care needs
If you’re worried about choosing the wrong type of care for your loved one, you will be relieved to know that all reputable, registered care providers will carry out a thorough assessment of care needs before putting any care options in place.
A care assessment is a way for the care provider to get to know the individual, and understand the type and level of care that they need to live well, whilst also learning about the things that are important to them as an individual.
Care assessments are often carried out with the involvement of family members, so that all of those involved in an individual’s care can input into the resulting personalised care plan.
Understanding care quality
The quality of care is arguably the most important factor when seeking care for a loved one – you need to be certain that your loved one will be in safe hands.
As part of your research into care options, consider the care provider’s inspection rating, along with any independently-verified customer reviews.
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspects all regulated care providers, assessing whether the service they provide is safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led, and giving them an overall rating of outstanding, good, requires improvement or inadequate. You can read reports and ratings for all registered care services on the CQC website.
Alongside checking their official rating, it is also worth checking independently-verified customer reviews for your preferred care provider, on unbiased platforms such as carehome.co.uk or homecare.co.uk. Genuine customer feedback – combined with official ratings and your own experiences of guided tours and care assessments – will provide you with valuable insight into the care and support on offer.
Paying for care
Money can be an uncomfortable subject, especially when discussing who should pay for care. Whilst high-quality care comes at a cost, your loved one may be eligible for financial support towards some or all of the cost of their care, subject to meeting eligibility criteria.
Eligibility for Local Authority funding is based upon the total value of savings and assets (such as property) that an individual has, compared to an ‘upper capital limit’ amount set by Government.
NHS funding may also be available through the Continuing Health Care (CHC) scheme, or the Funded Nursing Care (FNC) scheme, if the individual meets certain criteria in relation to long-term or complex medical conditions that they live with.
Seeking care information
At Somerset Care, we understand that seeking care for a loved one can feel overwhelming. We’re here to offer home care or care home advice and information, to help you make an informed decision about the right care service for your loved one and wider family.
Need to talk the options through?
Our aim is to make what can be an overwhelming and emotional journey as reassuring and straightforward as possible. Please contact our friendly Enquiries Team for expert care advice and to explore the support options available for you and your loved one.
