Respite Support - Organisations

Overview

Respite care is an essential part of the overall support for unpaid carers and those with care needs helping to sustain the caring relationship, enabling carers to have a life alongside the caring role, promoting health and well being and preventing crises.

Respite care encompasses a wide range of different arrangements which are both formal and informal. The common factor is not what type of support is used but its purpose - to provide a break which is a positive experience for the person with care needs and the carer. Respite can be categorised as ‘indirect respite’ and ‘direct respite’. Indirect respite can be explained as respite care for the cared for which enables the carer to have time to themselves. Direct respite is for the carer, so for example, carers retreat breaks, arranged trips for carers, and holidays purchased by carers with Carers Direct Payments.

Adult Social Services currently directly commissions a number of services that can be used to give respite support for adults with care needs and carers. As Adult Social Services has changed with the introduction of self directed support and personal budget arrangements we need review our approach to commissioning respite support and look at the services we currently commission, as well as the wider market. In order to do this, we want to understand how people currently access and use respite support, what type of support is most useful, and what could be improved or changed.

For the purposes of this consultation we are defining respite as:

“An arrangement (whether informal or a paid service) put in place for the specific purpose of providing a break in caring responsibilities for an unpaid carer”

By participating in this consultation you will be helping to shape the future respite support for adults with care needs and carers in Sutton

Why your views matter

We know there are a number of different ways that people organise a break from their caring role and we want to make sure that the support people need and want is available locally; although this does not necessarily mean formally commissioned services.  We are also interested in gathering the views of organisations either providing respite services, or representing/supporting people receiving informal or formal respite. We will use the results to help us shape our approach to commissioning respite support and your feedback is important to this process.