Can hearing interventions slow down cognitive decline?

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In this blog, Daisy Long and the elf apprentices that took part in the woodland workshop undertook a group critical analysis on Lin, F.R., Pike, J.R., Albert. M.S., Arnold, M., Burgard, S., Chisolm, T. & others (2023) paper on Hearing intervention versus health education control to reduce cognitive decline in older adults with hearing loss in the USA (ACHIEVE): a multi-centre, randomized controlled trial.

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Are Discharge to Assess services delivering on their promise?

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Daisy Long reviews E.W Gadsby, G Wistow & J Billings article A critical systems evaluation of the introduction of a ‘discharge to assess’ service in Kent

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What impacts on social workers attitudes towards evidence-based practice?

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Daisy Long is back to blogging for the National Elf Service and in her first blog she has reviewed M.Kagan’s 2022 article on Social Workers’ Attitudes towards Evidence-based Practice: A Multidimensional Perspective.

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When is the best time for a person with dementia to move to a care home?

There are more than 400,000 older people living in care homes in the United Kingdom (UK) and around 80% of those people are likely to have dementia (SCIE, 2020). Care homes can be funded by the local authority, the National Health Service (NHS) or privately: it is estimated that around 40% of residents in care [read the full story…]

COVID-19: Casting forward the shadow

For various reasons, including cultural and socioeconomic factors, parents of children with intellectual disability have been shown to be at a greater risk of developing psychological disorders. In this study, Baker et al. investigate the well-being of caregivers in that context.

While turning on the TV or radio to hear about other countries’ COVID-19 experiences is likely to be more of a home rather than work activity, there is also some value in thinking about this professionally. Fortunately, some people have done lots of the heavy lifting for us, by working collaboratively to share their thinking. [read the full story…]

Self-Funders in England: How much choice and control do they really have?

Choice self funders

Self-funders (or elf-funders) are people who have to pay for their social care using their own finances, as opposed to receiving partial or full funding from their local council’s adult social care department. In England a threshold exists of £23,250, those who have above this amount in savings and sometimes other assets are deemed to [read the full story…]

Enhancing primary care support for informal carers

An informal carer refers to someone who, “provides unpaid help and support to a partner, child, relative, friend or neighbour who could not manage without this help” (Beesley, 2006). Comparatively, people who choose to be carers have a higher quality of life than those who provide care as it is expected of them. Though health [read the full story…]

Implementing guidelines to protect long-term care facilities

Fail-Safe N versus Trim and Fill: choose your bias measure wisely. It could have a major impact on your results.

COVID-19 has brought unprecedented challenges across all levels of society, but older people have undoubtedly been at the highest risk from this disease, particularly those living in long-term care facilities. As in many countries, the Chilean government has produced guidelines and regulations to encourage the prevention and control of COVID-19 outbreaks in residential and nursing [read the full story…]

Managing demand for social care among adults with intellectual disabilities

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It is clear that adult social care in the United Kingdom (UK), as in many other countries, faces serious challenges, most simply summarised as rising demand from demographic changes and greater pressure on available resources. The interventions to address this will need to be at all levels (national policy and legislation, managing local systems and in individual [read the full story…]

Timebanking: from ideal to reality

Volunteering timebanking

There is increasing interest in co-production in public services and in social care. This blog reports on a PhD study of timebanks which are now seen as an example of co-production but have a long history in being promising indications of mutual aid and reciprocal support between members of local communities. Social care interest groups [read the full story…]