Live-in Care in Orpington

When the PRUH says a date: setting up live-in care for discharge

For Orpington families, hospital is close to home. The Princess Royal University Hospital on Farnborough Common takes the emergency admissions, and Orpington Hospital on Sevenoaks Road provides rehabilitation and has a frailty unit. Both are run by King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, and both are in BR6, close to the house.

Live-in care is worth raising with the ward when a short spell of visits will not be enough: someone who has been in hospital after a fall and is unsteady on their feet, a person with dementia who became more confused on the ward, or a spouse at home who cannot manage alone. A sensible order of events is:

1. Tell the ward staff and the hospital's social care team that the family wants live-in care considered.
2. Call us as soon as a likely date is mentioned, so we can assess and look at the house while the person is still in hospital.
3. Agree the equipment before discharge. A hospital bed, hoist or commode is far easier to fit when it arrives before the patient does.

We will tell you honestly whether we can have a carer ready for the date. Age UK Bromley & Greenwich runs a Take Home and Settle service that helps some patients in the first hours after discharge, on referral from hospital staff, and it can sit alongside a longer-term plan.

Bungalows, semis and the spare room

Orpington is built for live-in care in a way inner London is not. The town is largely semis, detached houses and bungalows built between the wars and after 1945, and the spare bedroom a carer needs is usually already there. A bungalow in Crofton or Green Street Green is the ideal: the person, the carer and the bathroom all on one level, with room for a wheelchair to turn. In a two-storey semi, decide early where the person will sleep. If the stairs are now the main risk, a downstairs bedroom with a commode, or a stairlift, lets the carer support them safely without the nightly climb. The newer flats near the station and High Street work too, provided there are two bedrooms.

Changeovers by car or by train

Orpington station has fast Southeastern services to London Bridge, Cannon Street, Charing Cross and Victoria, plus Thameslink, and Chelsfield station serves the south-east side. For a carer arriving from elsewhere in London, changeover day is straightforward. Further out, in the villages and estates away from the station, a carer who drives is often the better match, and here Orpington helps again: most houses have a drive, and the controlled parking zone is limited to the area round the station and town centre. Inside the zone, Bromley offers no carers' permit, so the carer's car relies on your visitor vouchers during controlled hours.

A break in the middle of town

Every live-in carer is entitled to a protected break each day. Orpington's centre has what they need within a short walk of each other: the shops of the High Street and the Walnuts, Orpington Library inside the Walnuts, and Priory Gardens, an ornamental park with lakes, where the River Cray rises.

Keeping a long marriage under one roof

When one half of a couple in an Orpington family home needs a lot of care, live-in support lets them stay there together: the carer handles washing, dressing and medication for the partner who needs it, cooks for both, and drives or travels with them to the PRUH for clinic appointments. We assess both partners, because the healthier one's needs and wishes shape the plan too.

How do Orpington families pay for live-in care?

Three ways, often in combination. The person can pay privately, with a written quote from us after the assessment. Bromley Council can carry out a needs assessment and a financial assessment, and if it contributes, the money can be taken as a direct payment and used for live-in care from an agency. Where needs are mainly health needs, NHS Continuing Healthcare may pay for everything; read the NHS explanation of Continuing Healthcare and ask the ward or GP about the checklist. The council contacts and our view of the borough's options are on the Bromley live-in care page. If visits are enough for now, see home care in Orpington; for how a placement runs day to day, see live-in care in London.

What we can help with in Orpington

• 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