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Office Monday to Friday, 9:00am – 5:00pm · On-call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
Call us on 01788 422422Office Monday to Friday, 9:00am – 5:00pm · On-call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
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Care at home
Respite is the one service on this site that is not really for the person receiving care. It is for you.
Nearly every family carer who rings us about respite explains why they need it, as though we are going to assess whether they deserve a break. You do not need a reason. Wanting a week away, or an afternoon, or a full night's sleep is reason enough. People who look after someone continuously get ill, and then there are two people needing care instead of one.
A holiday, a hospital appointment of your own, a wedding, or simply a standing Tuesday afternoon that is yours. Booked in advance, with the same carers wherever we can, so the person you look after is not being introduced to a stranger the day you leave.
Sometimes the carer is the one who ends up in hospital. We cannot promise to cover every emergency at no notice — nobody honest can — but tell us the situation and we will tell you straight away what we can and cannot do, rather than leaving you hoping.
Before a respite block starts we want the detail that lives in your head and nowhere else: which mug, which side they like to be helped from, what the shouting at bath time actually means. Write it down badly on the back of an envelope — that is genuinely fine and more useful than a care plan.
We would rather you knew this now than found out later.
We are one part of this. These are the people who do the things we cannot, and they are free.
You have a legal right to your own assessment as a carer, separate from the person you look after. It can lead to funded respite.
Advice, a helpline and support for unpaid carers.
Tell us the dates, even if they are months off. Planned respite is much easier to staff well than a last-minute request.
Worried about the cost? The council pays towards care at home for more people than realise it, and Attendance Allowance is not means-tested at all. See how paying for care works.