carers

Specialist mental health services for older people have grown rapidly and successfully over the past two decades, aiming to offer services that are comprehensive, accessible, responsive, individualised, multidisciplinary, accountable, and systematic. As with all mental health problems, the burden falls on primary care (where minor morbidity often goes undetected) and specialist services tend to be reserved for those conditions and patients where diagnosis and management is problematic.

This article describes how Thurrock Council Social Services Department and South Essex Mental Health and Community Care NHS Trust launched a joint initiative to develop an integrated service strategy and implementation plan for older people's mental health services in Thurrock. The main principles of the approach were: service user and carer involvement, the active participation of mental health professionals working directly with service users and carers, representatives from all key agencies involved in the planning process.

This paper investigates the prevalence of incapacity in performing daily activities and the associations between household composition and availability of family members and receipt of care among older adults with functioning problems in Spain, England and the United States of America (USA).

We sought to examine the mental and physical health and health-related quality of life of current and past carers compared to non-carers, using two instruments—the Short Form-12 (SF-12) and the EuroQol 5-dimension (EQ-5D). A total of 249 participants (34 current carers, 14 previous carers, 197 non-carers, 4 non-respondents) completed a baseline self-report survey at randomization into the larger study.

This article reports findings from the literature about available services and good practice in service provision for younger onset dementia, both from Australia and overseas. It looks at the different service needs for people with younger onset dementia, support for carers, and also lists appropriate services from Australia, UK and the US. The article acknowledges that there is still too little awareness of younger onset dementia but that there is an increasing interest from both policy makers and researchers.

The Carers (Recognition and Services) Act 1995 came into force on 1 April 1996. It entitles carers who are providing substantial amounts of care on a regular basis to an assessment of their needs and ability to care. Local authorities are required to take the results of this assessment into account when making decisions about services. This paper reports the key findings of a two-year study, conducted in Wales, that evaluated the process and outcomes of assessments carried out under the auspices of the Carers Act.

Reports on the evaluation of Dementia Care Trust's counselling service for carers, which now also offers counselling for people with dementia too.

This paper looks at the ambiguous journey travelled by family, mainly spouse, carers in Scotland is based on 37 interviews which formed part of a larger study exploring the subjective experience of 20 individuals with dementia. The majority of the interviews were conducted with the carer alone, others with the relative with dementia (RWD) present and some as joint interviews.

The majority of patients with Alzheimer's disease are cared for by their families at home. Caring for someone with Alzheimer's disease is commonly portrayed in terms of 'problematic' behaviour. This study explored the level of understanding carers have of the illness and the psychosocial impacts carers experience. Qualitative interviews were conducted with eight carers who had been looking after their relatives in community settings. Findings suggest that the carers in this study have a distinct lack of knowledge regarding Alzheimer's disease and its management.

Discusses the finding of research which looks at how carers from ethnic minorities view statutory services for family members with dementia. The research, funded by the School of Health and Social Welfare at the Open University, focused on people from south Asian or African-Caribbean backgrounds.