Barking · Barking and Dagenham
Home Care in Barking, IG11
Care at home in Barking town centre, the Gascoigne area and the streets around the Abbey, East Street and Upney Lane, in the west of Barking and Dagenham.
Yes, we provide home care in Barking. Of everywhere in the borough, Barking is the easiest for us to reach from our Lewisham office, so visiting care is a realistic option here. Whether we can take on a particular package still depends on having a carer free at your times, and we confirm that before agreeing to anything. Live-in care is available at any address with a spare bedroom. Everything starts with a free assessment at home and a written care plan.
Old terraces, new towers
Barking is the borough's old town. Barking Abbey was founded here in the 660s, and its ruins and the Curfew Tower still stand beside St Margaret's church, a few minutes from the East Street market. Around them the housing is mixed. Victorian and Edwardian terraces fill the side streets. Council tower blocks went up in the 1960s, and new high-rise flats are rising around the station and in the Gascoigne regeneration area, south of the town centre.
Each type of home changes how care works:
- Terraces usually have the only bathroom upstairs, up a narrow staircase. A stairlift, a commode or a bed moved downstairs is often part of the plan.
- Tower blocks and new flats are on one level, which helps. The building then depends on its lifts, though. If your relative needs a hoist, a wheelchair or a stretcher for hospital transport, an out-of-order lift is a real problem.
Plan for the day the lift breaks. If your relative lives above the ground floor, keep the housing provider's repairs number in the care plan folder. Agree with us what happens if a carer can't get a hoist or wheelchair upstairs: who gets told, and how the visit is covered.
Is Barking close enough for daily visits?
It is the closest part of Barking and Dagenham to us. From Lewisham High Street the journey is roughly 45 to 55 minutes: the DLR to Canning Town, the Jubilee line to West Ham, then the District line, Hammersmith & City line or c2c to Barking. Barking station is served by the District and Hammersmith & City lines, c2c, and the London Overground Suffragette line, which runs north to Gospel Oak and south to Barking Riverside. Buses from the station include the 62, 287 and 368 and the East London Transit routes EL1, EL2 and EL3.
Barking town centre is a controlled parking zone, which matters for carers who drive. Barking and Dagenham Council issues Community and Healthcare permits. A resident who receives care can apply on behalf of their carers. They need a GP or NHS letter, or proof of the care component of DLA or PIP. A care agency applying for its own permit has to show it is caring for a Barking and Dagenham resident.
Which hospital will my relative come home from?
Barking has no A&E of its own, and people are sent to different hospitals depending on where they live. The borough's main acute hospitals are Queen's Hospital in Romford and King George Hospital in Goodmayes, both run by Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust. Some people living near the Newham boundary go to Newham University Hospital in Plaistow instead. That hospital is run by Barts Health. Tell the ward early that you are arranging home care. Our hospital discharge support covers the first days back home.
Closer to home, Barking Community Hospital on Upney Lane has an urgent treatment centre led by GPs. It is not a full A&E. NELFT also runs community services from Orchards Health Centre on Gascoigne Road.
How do I arrange council-funded home care in Barking?
Contact Barking and Dagenham Council's Adult Intake Team on 020 8227 2915 or at intaketeam@lbbd.gov.uk and ask for a care needs assessment. If your relative has eligible needs, a means test decides how much they pay. For mainly health needs, ask the GP or hospital about NHS Continuing Healthcare. Council funding can be taken as a direct payment. Empower runs the council's direct payment support service. We give a written quote after our own assessment. Our Barking and Dagenham page and our guide to paying for care explain more.
Live-in care and breaks for family carers
For help day and night, a live-in carer moves in. They need their own bedroom and have daily breaks and cover for days off. Booked for a week or two, live-in care is also respite for a family carer.
Care we can arrange in Barking
- Personal care
- Medication support
- Home help
- Companionship
- Sit-in service
- Dementia care
- Live-in care
- Hospital discharge support
- Complex care
- Palliative care
What we can help with in Barking
- Personal care, washing and dressing
- Medication prompting and support
- Meals, laundry and home help
- Companionship and getting out
- Dementia care at home
- Support after a hospital stay
- Short breaks for family carers
- Live-in care when needs grow
Elsewhere in Barking and Dagenham
Home care pages for other parts of Barking and Dagenham:
Our services
How we can help in Barking and Dagenham
From a few visits a week to a carer who lives in, choose the support that fits.
Visiting care in Barking and Dagenham
Regular visits for personal care, medication, meals and company.
Read more →Live-in care in Barking and Dagenham
A carer who lives in, for one person or a couple.
Read more →Respite care in Barking and Dagenham
Cover so a family carer can rest, recover or go away.
Read more →Supported living in Barking and Dagenham
Our homes in Whitton, Kingston and Uxbridge.
Read more →Barking FAQs
Questions from families in Barking
Questions families ask us about Barking. If yours is not here, ask us directly.
Ask a questionMum lives on the tenth floor of a block near the station. Can you still provide care?
Yes. Being on one level often makes daily care easier. At the assessment we check the lifts, where any equipment would go and how she would get out of the building in an emergency, and we write a plan for lift breakdowns into her care plan.
Dad went to Barking Community Hospital, but they sent him on to Queen's. Why?
The Upney Lane site is an urgent treatment centre, not a full A&E, so anyone who needs admission is usually sent on to Queen's Hospital or King George Hospital. Planning for his return home is then done with that hospital's ward team and the council's Adult Intake Team.
Our street is in the town centre parking zone. Where would a carer park?
Your relative can apply for a Community and Healthcare permit for their carers, with the evidence the council asks for. Until a permit is in place, carers use pay-and-display or visitor parking, so tell us at the assessment what the parking is like on your road.
Can a carer take Gran to East Street market or the Abbey grounds?
Yes, if it is written into her plan. A short walk into the town centre with a carer alongside counts as companionship time, and it keeps her part of the town she knows.
Get started
Looking for care in Barking?
Tell us what is happening and we will tell you honestly whether we can help, and how.