The first four things worth doing
- Ask the council for a needs assessment for your parent, and a carer's assessment for yourself. Both are free.
- Ask the GP surgery to record you as a named contact.
- Sort lasting power of attorney for health and for finances while capacity is clear.
- Check Attendance Allowance eligibility — it is not means tested and is widely unclaimed.
Work out what kind of help is actually needed
Care needs fall into rough groups: practical (shopping, cleaning, transport), personal (washing, dressing), social (company, purpose), and prompting (remembering what happens when). Families often reach for personal care when what is really missing is prompting and company.
Naming the category makes the choice of help obvious, and usually cheaper.
Keep your own life in the picture
The pattern is always the same: your own plans go first, then your health, then you wonder why you have nothing left. Deciding early what you will not give up is not selfish, it is how people last.
Get a second person involved from the beginning, even if their contribution is small. Solo caring is much harder to unwind later.
Where we fit
You Care Reminders handles the everyday prompting: drinks, meals, walks, appointments and calls, delivered as a phone call, a text, or an alert on their phone, with one button to confirm. No app for them to install, and never anything to do with medication.
The wider picture
5.0 million
people in England and Wales provide unpaid care, according to the 2021 Census.
a legal right
every unpaid carer in England can ask their council for a carer's assessment, whatever their income or savings.
Source: NHS