carers

This paper is concerned with improving assessment practices with people who are carers of people with mental illness. It is established that the well-being of carers is negatively impacted by the burden of their caring role, and that the needs of carers are often overlooked and poorly responded to by formal helping services. It is the purpose here to report on findings from the data provided by a subset of participants from a broader collaborative research project that developed and trialled a carer’s assessment tool.

This paper reviews the challenges faced by unpaid family carers and the current support and services available to them. It argues that current carer support should be built on and presents the evidence for doing so, including evidence of the opportunities to make substantial savings in residential care costs. The paper suggests a new way in which proposed resource allocation and personal budget systems could be developed in order to sustain caring, avoiding the risk of a new perverse incentive to families to end caring roles.

The Carers and Disabled Children Act (2000) has the potential to fundamentally change carers services and the way they are currently delivered. As yet, there is little published work that considers the implications of this Act either for local authorities or informal carers themselves. This paper examines the practical issues involved in the implementation of the Act in terms of: providing equitable services, defining terms, young carers and care package limits, local authority eligibility criteria and whether funding is adequate.

The overall aim of the A.C.T.I.O.N. research project (Assisting Carers using Telematic Interventions to meet Older person's Needs) is to maintain or enhance the autonomy, independence and quality of life of frail older and disabled people and their family carers by providing information, advice and support in the home. The authors report on the first phase of evaluation conducted using a case-study approach to test the A.C.T.I.O.N. system in several family carers' homes in Sheffield, England.

Provides an overview of recent research which aimed to development of a 'profile' of older carers. The review increases understanding of who cares in later life and offers a detailed 'profile' of older carers in the UK.

Policy rhetoric over recent decades has promoted social inclusion of the more vulnerable sectors of society, such as people with learning difficulties. This study aimed to describe the experiences of adults with learning difficulties in north-east England and their family and to appraise their care. Thirty-five people with a learning difficulty and/or a family member were interviewed. A model of social coherence was developed that moves beyond the self-limiting debates about social inclusion and exclusion.

Phillipa Hare offers some practical advice on how general practices can identify and record carers within their areas. 3 refs. [Introduction]

Recent pronouncements from both government and carers' organisations have expressed disappointment at the low numbers of carers' assessments being undertaken by social care practitioners. The reasons offered for this are varied. They commonly tend to emphasise issues of bureaucratic incompetence, for example the failure by Social Services Departments to provide information to carers about their rights, or else highlighting practitioner attitudes that are out of step with current thinking, for example wanting to retain decision-making power and not involving carers.

A project worker who identified gaps in services for ethnic minority carers of people with mental health difficulties provided the catalyst for Birmingham's Pamela Project, which won a Community Care Award. Anabel Unity Sale reports. [Introduction]

This study aims to measure the causal effect of informal caregiving on the health and health care use of women who are caregivers, using instrumental variables. We use data from South Korea, where daughters and daughters-in-law are the prevalent source of caregivers for frail elderly parents and parents-in-law.