Aged Care: a Family Affair Jill Manthorpe King’s College London @scwru @jillmanthorpe Jill.manthorpe@kcl.ac.uk
Not everyone has family
Mary Webster - London School of Economics The history girl – founder of early carers’ movement – National Council for the Single Woman and her Dependents Thinking about the Care Act and Carers today, we are at the heart of carers campaigning – here at LSE, over 50 years ago Mary Webster made the start of this social movement Mary Webster - London School of Economics
Social Work with Carers Common themes: Crisis Conflict (in)Continence Cash Consumer-Directed Care Carers (non-human)
Crisis (social work tasks) Geographies of carers – social work responses to explain or navigate UK keen to help carers keep in work (including social workers) Role of anticipatory care – making decisions in advance & appointing proxies Holding and watchful waiting Interested in self-neglect & hoarding Photo from Caring at a Distance – bridging the gap, Employers for Carers, 2011 But we are beginning to take more account of geography, adapting to social changes of mobility
Conflict? Perhaps the most common pictures of care are in social and cultural spheres
Social Work roles in family conflict Alert & respond to elder abuse risks Alert & respond to carer stress and distress Use tools of mediation, family group conferences and legal/persuasive interventions
Continence (in) - the Silent Subject Surprising omission in social work texts and programmes Offering acceptable help – individual reactions Open the subject but don’t undermine Better kit !
Our Consumer Directed Care Carers are eligible for Direct Payments (to meet own needs) Can also be proxies for disabled person unable to consent /manage them More active ‘shopping’ in UK wither with cash or provider Social work role from start, set up agreed plan, to monitoring, review… NB UK = adults not aged (personal budgets)
Non- human Carers – kit not kin? Japanese 'robot with a heart' will care for the elderly and children… The robot dubbed 'Pepper' will go on sale for £1,150 and uses a cloud-based AI system so that units learn from one another… The Independent, 16 July 2014 Social Work tasks? Shopping, using, repair, maintenance, quality … Do we know? But technology is asking the frontier questions, do you have to be a human to care?
Thanks and acknowledgements Thanks for listening and thanks to my research colleagues and our funders – the Department of Health – views are my own