Working with unpaid carers

There are at least 370,000 carers in Wales. At 12 per cent, Wales has the highest proportion of carers in the UK, many of whom provide more than 50 hours of care a week. Census records tell us that there are over 30,000 carers under the age of 25 in Wales, 7,500 of whom are under the age of 16.

The Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 ensures that all carers have a right to an assessment where it appears they may have needs for support. The assessment must consider the outcomes the carer wants to achieve, which is why a ‘what matters’ conversation needs to happen right at the very beginning of any interaction with a carer.

We’ve developed a toolkit of four resources to help practitioners assess carers’ support needs.

The resources will help practitioners carry out good quality carers’ assessments and will guide practitioners in working with carers and families to find out what really matters to them and enable them to achieve their outcomes.

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The course will give users the opportunity to explore some key topics around caring, such as:

• who is a carer
• the types of support carers provide
• the impact of a caring role can have
• what carers need
• carer rights and entitlements, the law and where to find out what support is available to them.

Following successful completion, learners can download a personalised certificate of completion to support their on-going personal development.

The course will take around 45 mins to complete.

Access the resource on the the NHS learning website

We asked the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) to do an overview of recent research on what works best to support adult carers.

Preventative support for adults carers in Wales: rapid review, looks at effective ways to support the 370,000 carers who care for other adults in Wales.

Carers who support family members or friends are a crucial part of the heath and care system, and they have a legal right to an assessment and support plan for themselves. The rapid review will help inform our improvement planning over the next five years.

A new series of practice examples SCIE Practice examples: Preventative support for adult carers in Wales have been developed to help stimulate discussion about the models of support available to carers.

The practice examples support the Preventative support for adults carers in Wales: rapid review.

We provide a range of learning resources to support social care professionals to learn more about the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act as it applies to carers. Carers and the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act: Working with Carers learning resource.

Often carers may need help learning how to do practical care tasks for their family member. In response to this need we developed a resource pack to help professionals gain the skills they need to demonstrate care tasks to family carers.

If you have a question or if you can't find what you are looking for get in touch with us.