Live-in Care in Northwood

Yes, we provide live-in care in Northwood and Northwood Hills. A carer lives in your home, supports you through the day and is in the house overnight, working to a written care plan agreed after a free home assessment. Northwood is at the very top of the borough, so live-in care is how we cover it: the carer makes the long journey at the start of a placement, not twice a day.

A big house, a long staircase

Northwood's older homes are generous: Edwardian and interwar houses, detached or semi-detached, with several bedrooms and long gardens. A spare room for a carer is almost never the issue. The challenges are the size and shape of the house.

• Stairs. Older Northwood houses often have a turning staircase or a half-landing. A curved stairlift is usually possible but needs a survey and a custom rail, so it takes longer to arrange than a straight one. Until it is fitted, a bed in a ground-floor room and a commode may be the safer arrangement.
• Distance inside the house. In a large house the carer's room can be a floor away from yours. We agree how you call them at night, whether that is a bell, a monitor or moving the carer to the room next door.
• Bathing. Original bathrooms tend to have a high-sided bath. A bath lift or a shower conversion is often the first adaptation, and Hillingdon's occupational therapy service can assess for it.
• The house and garden. A live-in carer keeps the person's rooms, meals and laundry in order. A big garden, gutters and a whole house of rooms are a job for a gardener or cleaner, not the carer.

Retirement apartment blocks near the station and Green Lane have lifts, which helps, but a carer needs a second bedroom inside the flat itself. If there is not one, our home care in Northwood page covers the alternatives.

What happens if Mum is having a planned operation at Mount Vernon?

Mount Vernon Hospital on Rickmansworth Road is a planned-surgery and outpatient hospital, and Harefield Hospital, the specialist heart and lung centre, is a short drive west. A planned operation gives you something an emergency admission does not: time. You can have the assessment done, the room ready and the carer booked before the admission date, so the carer is waiting when the patient comes home.

That matters after a joint replacement or heart surgery, when the first weeks bring stairs, dressings, new medication and a lot of tiredness. Emergencies in HA6 still go to Hillingdon Hospital in Uxbridge, because Mount Vernon has no A&E, and discharge from there is less predictable. Either way, our hospital discharge page explains the steps.

Changeovers on the Metropolitan line

Northwood and Northwood Hills stations are on the Metropolitan line only, and from our Lewisham office the journey is an hour and a half or more. We schedule changeovers with that in mind, and the outgoing carer stays until the new one has been briefed.

Most HA6 roads are free to park on, and if the house has a drive, a relief carer arriving by car can simply use it. Some roads near the stations and shopping parades have Parking Management Scheme permit bays, with the hours shown on the bay signs. If your road is in a zone, the household can book visitor sessions for the incoming carer through the council's parking permits account.

Where the carer takes their break

The carer has time off every day. Northwood Recreation Ground on Chestnut Avenue, public open space since 1913, is the nearest green space for a walk. The shops on Green Lane are there for errands. Northwood's library is currently a pop-up at the Kate Fassnidge Community Hall on the High Street, and Northwood Hills Library is on Potter Street.

Northwood Hills Library also runs one of the council's free dementia groups, which gives the person a reason to go out with the carer and a familiar group to see each week.

Who pays for live-in care in Northwood?

We quote in writing after the free assessment. Hillingdon Council can assess needs and finances, and our live-in care in Hillingdon page explains how to ask and how a home you live in is treated. Where needs are mainly health needs, for example after major surgery or near the end of life, the NHS may fund the whole package; see the NHS Continuing Healthcare guide. For the service in general, see live-in care in London.

What we can help with in Northwood

• A carer living in, with their own room
• Care for one person or a couple
• Personal care through the day
• Medication support
• Cooking, housekeeping and laundry
• Dementia support at home
• Company, outings and appointments
• Cover arranged for the carer's breaks