About Personal Assistants
Social care is the support which helps ensure older people, people with chronic health conditions and people with a disability have the best possible quality of live and opportunity for independent living. For this people require personally tailored services that give them maximum choice, control and power over the services they receive.
Self-assessment and single assessment by health or social care services is a first step. The assessment should be about your needs and aspirations, hence identifying the support you need and seeking its provision.
If the local authority agrees that care at home is appropriate, you can usually receive Direct Payments, so you can arrange and pay your own care services instead of having them provided by the Local Authority. Once you know how much your Direct Payments will be, you can begin to work out how much to pay a Personal Assistant and how many hours a week and what hours you would like your Personal Assistant to work.
What a professional carer can do for you
Professional carers can do much to meet these requirements. Some have a variety of skills, some have nursing and first aid qualifications and others may be home helps, or Personal Assistants. Examples of the types of support a carer or Personal Assistant provides include:
- Cooking and cleaning
- Support to gain confidence personally and socially
- Help with personal care like washing or using the toilet
- Driving or help with getting around
- Medical tasks like giving injections or changing a catheter
- Help with shopping, gardening, banking and paying bills
Your options for professional home care
If you are looking for a care worker to help you live independently at home, there are three basic options:
- Through your council's Social Services department - in which case everything is arranged for you.
- Through a home care agency - this means you have to find and pay the Care Agency, but will take on none of the responsibilities as an employer because the carer is employed by the agency.
- Employ someone yourself (a Personal Assistant) - this option gives you more choice and control over who cares for you and what tasks they do, but also means you have legal responsibilities as an employer for their pay, health and safety and training.