carers

Using interviews with two parent carers, and with specialist input from Peter McGill (Senior Lecturer in Learning Disability at the University of Kent at Canterbury Tizard Centre), this 40 minute video gives a basic introduction to challenging behaviour associated with severe learning disabilities. The video has been produced for parents and carers of individuals with severe learning disabilities and challenging behaviour, or anyone wanting to understand what it can be like for the families involved.

This article discusses the aims and objectives of the new working-age agency, Jobcentre Plus, and the challenges faced by staff in the former Employment Service and Benefits Agency in delivering on its vision of a work-focused service designed to reach 'hard to help' groups. It looks at the training needs of staff involved in the new service, and how the Jobcentre Plus Stakeholder Forum contributed to identifying them. It considers some of the early successes and problems in this process, and then goes on to explore the needs of one particular client group, carers.

Colin Dugdale, BSc, RMN, RGN, dementia trailblazer, NHS Executive North West. As a community mental health nurse team leader I was seconded to the NHS Executive North West for the role of dementia trailblazer to develop the Admiral Nurse Service in the north-west of England.

Unpaid carers provide the backbone for community care, supplying the everyday support and care to users which paid carers would otherwise have to provide. There is increasing political awareness about the need to support carers if the rhetoric of community care is to be a reality. Both research and policy documents emphasise the carer's need for information. Carers see the Primary Health Care Team as being pivotal in providing them with advice, support and information. This paper describes a study to identify carers in a general practice and to provide them with information.

The aim of this study was to explore the psychological processes and information needs in a group of 78 Hospital-in-the-Home (HITH) carers, randomly selected from two university teaching hospital HITH programs in Melbourne. Semi-structured interviews were conducted and explored with a computerised lexical thematic content analysis program. The results revealed that psychological themes of carers were mainly related to HITH clinical processes, procedures and the prediction of complications or deterioration of the patient.

The quality of life of the person confronting the end stages of their life may be severely compromised without the support of family caregivers. Indeed, most people requiring palliative care would not be able to fulfill their preferences, such as care at home, without significant family caregiver input. As a consequence, health services are mandated to support the family alongside the person diagnosed with a life-threatening illness. In short, palliative care is supposed to be family centred. However, the quality and type of support made available to family caregivers has been questioned.

This article reviews literature on the experiences of family carers when a relative goes into long-term care, with the aim of informing nurses on providing support. Experiences before and after the care placement are explored. The study found nurses fail to recognise carers' expert knowledge and skills about their cared for relatives. Families perceive their loved one's values, beliefs and life history are ignored. Nurses need to challenge barriers to communication, and move away from paternalistic and ritualised care practice. 

Good multi-professional care in the field of dementia is essential, so all practitioners must understand what is needed, say social care researcher Jill Manthorpe and health researcher Steve Iliffe.

This report presents findings of a questionnaire-based survey of the financial position of carers in the UK conducted by the Carers National Association (CNA), the starting point of which was that government carers strategies published recently for England and Scotland have omitted to address carers' financial problems. The survey suggested that a large proportion of carers providing substantial care are faced with financial hardship.

Objective: The objective of this study is to test the validity of an accreditation programme for memory services in the UK by investigating whether different levels of accreditation status (excellent compared with accredited) are reflected in patients' and carers' reported satisfaction. Method: A comparison of survey data from patient and carer feedback questionnaires collected from services as part of the accreditation process. Results: Five hundred and eighty-three patient questionnaires and 663 carer questionnaires were returned from 41 services.