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Community social work, older people and informal care: a romantic illusion?
- Authors:
- GORDON David, DONALD Sheena
- Publisher:
- Avebury
- Publication year:
- 1993
- Pagination:
- 186p.,tables,bibliog.
- Place of publication:
- Aldershot
Questions the nature of the relationship between the informal and formal worlds of care for older people and the practical question of whether community based social workers can materially change the relationship. Focuses on the work of the Aberdeen Informal Support and Care Project which was set up to develop a local interweaving of the two worlds to produce more effective care.
Utilisation of personal care services in Scotland: the influence of unpaid carers
- Author:
- LEMMON Elizabeth
- Journal article citation:
- Journal of Long-Term Care, July 2020, pp.54-69. Online only
- Publisher:
- King's College London
- Place of publication:
- London
Context: Unpaid carers may have an influence on the formal care utilisation of the cared for. Whether this influence is positive or negative will have important implications for the costs of formal care provision. Scotland, where personal care services are free to all individuals aged 65+, provides an interesting context in which to study this relationship. Moreover, the Scottish government is unique in its collection of administrative data on all social care clients. Objective: To investigate how the presence of an unpaid carer influences personal care use by those aged 65+ in Scotland. Methods: Two-part models (2PMs) are estimated using Scotland’s Social Care Survey (SCS) for the years 2014–2016. An instrumental variable (IV) approach is also implemented to deal with endogeneity concerns. Findings: The results suggest that unpaid care complements personal care services. In particular, the presence of an unpaid carer is associated with an increase in weekly personal care hours by 1 hour and 14 minutes per week, on average, other things being equal. Limitations: Concerns are noted surrounding the generalisability of results and lack of information available on client need and unpaid carers, arising from the very nature of conducting research using administrative data. Nevertheless, the findings are robust to a variety of sensitivity checks. Implications: Complementarity between unpaid and paid care may imply that unpaid carers are encouraging service use or demanding services on behalf of the cared for. Thus, policy interventions aimed at incentivising unpaid care could in fact lead to increased personal care costs to local authorities. Having said that, the complementary relationship might suggest that unpaid carers are being supported in their role and this might reduce pressure on formal care services longer term. (Edited publisher abstract)
Home base
- Author:
- CURTICE Lisa
- Journal article citation:
- Health Service Journal, 12.10.95, 1995, pp.28-29.
- Publisher:
- Emap Healthcare
One of Scotland's first schemes to offer physically frail elderly people the choice of being cared for in their home rather than in a long stay bed or nursing home is under way in Ayrshire and Arran. Intensive domiciliary care is offered in order to sustain people in their own homes as long as it is viable.
Information-sharing with respite care services for older adults: a qualitative exploration of carers' experiences
- Author:
- McSWIGGAN Linda C.
- Journal article citation:
- Health and Social Care in the Community, 25(4), 2017, p.1404–1415.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
Respite services play an important role in supporting older adults and their carers. When an older person is unable to fully represent themselves, provision of respite care relies on effective information-sharing between carers and respite staff. This study aimed to explore, from carers' perspectives, the scope, quality and fit of information-sharing between carers, older people and respite services. An explorative, cross-sectional qualitative study involving a purposive sample of 24 carers, recruited via carer support groups and community groups in voluntary organisations, was undertaken in North East Scotland. Data were collected from August 2013 to September 2014, with participants taking part in a focus group or individual interview. Data were analysed systematically using the Framework Approach. The multiple accounts elicited from carers identified how barriers and facilitators to information-sharing with respite services changed over time across three temporal phases: ‘Reaching a point’, ‘Trying it out’ and ‘Settled in’. Proactive information-sharing about accessibility and eligibility for respite care, and assessment of carers' needs in their own right, were initially important; as carers and older people moved on to try services out, time and space to develop mutual understandings and negotiate care arrangements came to the fore; then, once shared expectations had been established, carers' chief concerns were around continuity of care and maintaining good interpersonal relationships. The three temporal phases also impacted on which modes of information-sharing were available to, and worked best for, carers as well as on carers' perceptions of how information and communication technologies should be utilised. This study highlights the need for respite staff to take proactive, flexible approaches to working with carers and to make ongoing efforts to engage with carers, and older people, throughout the months and years of them utilising respite services. Information and communication technologies have potential to enhance information-sharing but traditional approaches will remain important. (Publisher abstract)
Using carer biographical narratives to explore factors involved in proxy reporting of quality of life in people with dementia
- Author:
- ROBERTSON Jane M.
- Journal article citation:
- Aging and Mental Health, 21(4), 2017, pp.416-425.
- Publisher:
- Taylor and Francis
Objectives: Quality of life is an important focus of research on dementia, with interest in direct reports of people with dementia and proxy reports of their carers. By exploring the subjective perspectives of unpaid family carers and paid care workers, this study aims to understand how carers construct meaning in narratives about quality of life with dementia. Method: A case-centred approach involved biographical narrative interviews with 10 carers to explore what was important for people with dementia to have a good quality of life. Detailed narrative analysis attended to the linguistic and structural features of accounts to consider how dementia is conceptualised by carers in the framing of quality of life. Results: An individual's perception of how dementia impacts on awareness and behaviour was central to their understanding of quality of life. Carers who constructed dementia as a loss of skills and abilities were able to represent quality of life in positive terms despite the challenges of dementia. Carers who constructed dementia as eroding identity represented quality of life less positively and centred on their own means of coping with a challenging care situation. Conclusion: Findings highlight the importance of helping carers develop positive constructions of quality of life that are associated with understanding dementia as a loss of skills and abilities, rather than as a loss of self. Engaging with subjectivity in carers’ biographical narrative accounts is important in the development of quality of life assessment to understand the meanings and emotions that underlie proxy perspectives. (Publisher abstract)
Homing in on care: a review of home care services for older people
- Author:
- AUDIT SCOTLAND
- Publisher:
- Accounts Commission
- Publication year:
- 2001
- Pagination:
- 64p.
- Place of publication:
- Edinburgh
The Government’s community care policy is about enabling people to live as normally and as independently as possible. In practice this means that, wherever possible, people should be helped to continue living in their own homes, or in as homely a setting as possible, rather than in institutional care. Recent policy papers from the Scottish Executive require councils, which have lead responsibility for community care, to further develop home care services to provide a viable alternative to institutional care. Home care services are critical to the success of community care. They have developed over the past decade to cover not just the traditional ‘home help’ domestic tasks, like housework and shopping, but also to include personal care, like help with bathing and dressing. Twice as many older people receive home care services than residential or nursing home care. Around 20 million hours of home care each year are provided or purchased by Scottish local authorities for over 70,000 people, of whom 85% are aged 65 years and over. By contrast, around 35,000 older people are in residential or nursing homes. The demand for community care services in general, and home care services in particular, is likely to increase over the next decade due to a number of factors.
Homing in on care: a review of home care services for older people; executive summary
- Author:
- AUDIT SCOTLAND
- Publisher:
- Accounts Commission
- Publication year:
- 2001
- Pagination:
- 14p.
- Place of publication:
- Edinburgh
The Government’s community care policy is about enabling people to live as normally and as independently as possible. In practice this means that, wherever possible, people should be helped to continue living in their own homes, or in as homely a setting as possible, rather than in institutional care. Recent policy papers from the Scottish Executive require councils, which have lead responsibility for community care, to further develop home care services to provide a viable alternative to institutional care. Home care services are critical to the success of community care. They have developed over the past decade to cover not just the traditional ‘home help’ domestic tasks, like housework and shopping, but also to include personal care, like help with bathing and dressing. Twice as many older people receive home care services than residential or nursing home care. Around 20 million hours of home care each year are provided or purchased by Scottish local authorities for over 70,000 people, of whom 85% are aged 65 years and over. By contrast, around 35,000 older people are in residential or nursing homes. The demand for community care services in general, and home care services in particular, is likely to increase over the next decade due to a number of factors.
Signposts to support: understanding the special needs of carers of people with dementia
- Author:
- ALZHEIMER SCOTLAND - ACTION ON DEMENTIA
- Publisher:
- Alzheimer Scotland
- Publication year:
- 2003
- Pagination:
- 64p.
- Place of publication:
- Edinburgh
Caring for people with dementia is a very different from caring for people affected by other types of disability. THis report is based on an extensive literature search on the special needs of carers of people with dementia and of specific sub-groups of carers. Individual situations will influence carers' ability to care and the support they require: the characteristics of the person with dementia, relationship to the cared-for person, the carer's health, coping skills, other caring duties, socio-economic status, cultural factors and the availability of other informal support and formal care.
Over the threshold: an exploration of intensive domiciliary support for older people
- Authors:
- CURTICE Lisa, et al
- Publisher:
- Scotland. Scottish Executive Central Research Unit
- Publication year:
- 2002
- Pagination:
- 119p.,bibliog.
- Place of publication:
- Edinburgh
This study aimed to examine the extent to which frail older people are able to remain in their own homes with intensive and flexible domiciliary care packages. In particular, it sought to explore the factors influencing the delivery of intensive flexible support, whether users have the choice, the contribution of various sectors, the impact of local authority purchasing and cost effectiveness.