Following on from your initial contact, we will arrange to come and visit you in your own home (with your family present if preferred). We will discuss your needs and understand what you would like to achieve from having our support. We don’t put any pressure on you to use our services we will simply chat about what we can do to help make your life easier. From this initial visit we will prepare a personalised care plan (often referred to as a ‘Care Package’) which is specific to you.
The care plan will include the specific activities and tasks that our carers will perform along with a schedule of visits detailing the times, duration and cost. There are no hidden extras and no surprises, so you can be safe in the knowledge of what we’ll be doing, when we’ll be doing it and the total cost for doing so.
Each care plan is individual to you and ‘person centered’. Clients, their families and carers all have an input into the content of the Care Plan to ensure we provide the care required. We then carry out a risk assessment for all aspects of the Care Plan to ensure the safety of our clients and our Carers.
The duration of homecare visits vary from client to client depending on their needs and wishes, with a minimum duration of 30 minutes. Able Living can offer visits 7 days a week, 365 days a year between the hours of 7.30am and 10.30pm. At Able Living, we have invested in a new care management system to ensure we’re operating as efficiently and reliably as possible.
Carers use a mobile phone to record visit times and durations and also to record details of their visits. This allows us to strengthen record keeping and avoid ineffiecient paperwork, improve communication and reduce risks. Families can also login to this system at any time so they can stay fully informed.
This is especially useful for people who live some distance away and provides families with reassurance and comfort that their loved ones are being cared for regularly.
Our carers are also supported by a highly experienced management team who are always available to offer advice, guidance, support and information whenever they need it.
Its not just about the homecare visits from the carers, our care extends beyond the moment we leave a client’s home. Care plans, medication needs and risk assessments are constantly reviewed and updated to ensure any changing needs are met.
Communication is vital to delivering a quality service, whether this is sharing information with carers, keeping clients and their families informed or liasing with district nurses, GP’s and other medical professions; at Able Living we work tirelessly to ensure everyone has up-to-date information, all of the time.
The wellbeing of our clients is at the heart of everything we do and we regularly organise social events such as coffee mornings, bingo and christmas parties to provide opportunities for social interaction for those who want to. Being with a group of people is not for everyone, sometimes we need to support people with hobbies and interests for them to do on their own or with a carer and we call these ‘meaningful activities’.
We work hard to build relationships with our clients and their families to understand as much as possible about each individual person, building a foundation of trust and friendship.
People often have many questions about the cost of care, in particular whether they can receive support from the Local Authority or Government to help fund the cost. Depending on the circumstances, help may be available through benefits entitlement, NHS continued health care funding or local authority funding and our team can point you to relevant information, to help understand how these may be applicable to you.
Your local council website and the government website also have a wealth of information regarding the support you can receive.
The charges for Able Living Services are transparent, all inclusive and agreed at the outset. We benchmark them against other home care providers and we are confident that our charges are extremely competitive when compared to other homecare providers. Homecare visits are charged according to duration and charges are invoiced monthly in arrears.