Options for home help for elderly parents

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Marine1

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My in laws are going to need some home help, MIL is 74 and FIL is 78, until literally last week my MIL was in rude health but she had quite a bad scare over the weekend and will take some time to recover so they will need someone in to help with some cooking and light house work, i guess 2 hours a day 4/5 days a week.

Any ideas how best to look into arrange this? Money isnt really an issue for them so at least there is that!
 
Peanuts20 said:
what you can get through the state
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It likely will be less than you expect or need; but you will get the assessment / referral which is where you need to start.

Their main focus is on personal care, getting up / washed / dressed. Cleaning the floor or peeling spuds is not on their list.

You can pay for additional hours also, I'd recommend doing so.

If you have meals on wheels in the area its an excellent service; again need referral from Public Health Nurse.
 
There are agencies that advertise home help also, home instead, Irish home care, etc (I just googled). Plus put up notice in local shop, post office, for locals who are interested. The level of help does not seem to be in the home help area yet, which give help in dressing, eating, personal care such as showering etc, so you may just need a cleaner housekeeper type at present. On the plus side if your in-laws get on well with someone it can be very beneficial if in the longer term they need more hours or care.
 
Fully agree with @Peanuts20 & @DannyBoyD above. It may take a bit of time to get organised but the needs assessment will be thorough. These services and assessments are available irrespective of whether the intended recipients hold medical cards or not.

Not all services are available in all areas. Some of my neighbours had their meals on wheels services withdrawn and podiatry services cancelled due to lack of staff.
 
Without sounding morbid on things, but now is also the time to start thinking further down the line and things like POA and Fair Deal which once they are set up and/or applied for, will sit there until they are needed over the next few years.
 
DannyBoyD said:
It likely will be less than you expect or need; but you will get the assessment / referral which is where you need to start.
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Actually, we managed to get the public health nurse to visit our parents as they are 82 and 79, one has just been diagnosed with mild dementia and the other is quite feeble. We were quite pleasantly surprised by how much was on offer. Our main concern had been that the father is incontinent and was paying for pads for himself at quite some expense, and hasn't the money for it. Someone we knew said he should be able to get them through the HSE. So it turned out there was a few more things they could help with. There is a bit of home help available for some I think, but the problem in many cases is that a lot of older women are still "house proud" and won't let anybody in to clean the house unless they've done it themselves first, even though they are completely unable to do it.

POA is definitely something you should consider now, as it is more difficult later on if they are unable to make decisions for themselves. The problem again might be a reluctance to admit that there are things that they cannot do without help.
 
AFAIK the max number of hours per person per week is 21. So that’s 3 one hour visits per person per day. that’s 42 for your parents.

We have 21 hours for my dad and 15 for mum. Public health nurse inspection etc.

The carers are generally very good and very flexible. They will help with showers and dressing and also peel spuds and set the fire. Some won’t but on the whole they are willing and with some instruction, which mum is willing to provide, will turn their hands to most tasks.

Took a while to get mum to allow a young foreign lass/lad help her around the house but eventually she started to see that she couldn’t do it all herself. And she actually enjoys the chats now over how to set a fire and cook spuds. In return mum has learned lots about their cultures and cooking and dad has enjoyed sharing his 90 years of GAA knowledge with them.

We worked hard to develop a relationship with the company contracted by the HSE. That’s worth doing. We meet with them regularly, my siblings and I and my parents and their manager.

It’s been a journey and sometimes it’s hard but the alternative is a nursing home and this is way better
 
@Purple very true. I wouldn't do the job for any wages, and the wages are crap anyway.

Home help is far better than a nursing home in every respect by all accounts, and also much cheaper for everyone. Tax relief is available at 40% FWIW. They came in for between 20 and 40 minutes at a time I think.

In my experience of carers coming for a parent, the carers were only supposed to help with personal care but they'd nearly be sweeping under your feet and washing your cutlery while you were still chewing. And the chats of course. All the carers were all great really.

But nearly the biggest benefit was just someone coming in at least once a day, with different people coming in. It meant regularly having a different pair of outside eyes (3 or 4 carers over the course of a week I think it was) so more opportunity for issues on any nature to be spotted and reported.

EDIT to avoid waiting an hour @ClubMan no, it's at the marginal rate. I can't post links yet put it's the first line of section 3 of Revenue's page for

Employing a carer​

 
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In terms of times of visits some of dad’s carers are there for an hour. And if the same carer is covering both of them (mum has 5 x 30 mins a week) s/he might be there for 90 minutes.

And they have a variety of backgrounds and experiences. A few recent ones we’ve had include foreign qualified nurses where their qualifications aren’t recognised here or where they are working through the additional qualifications they need to work in a hospital here, student doctors from overseas at UDC who need part time work, retired physiotherapist who still want to work part time (he’s great with dad, keeps him walking and is building up his strength), parents juggling work and children.

The constant changing can be a problem but that’s the nature of low paid work.
 
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