Live-in Care in Westbourne Park

Westbourne Park homes in W2 and W9, and the W11 streets over the Kensington and Chelsea line, can all have a carer living in. Ours bring a bag, take the spare room, and spend the day on washing, tablets, cooking and company. Jackie, who runs the service, looks round first without charge. As the carer arrives once and stays for weeks, the length of the journey from Lewisham stops being a factor.

Why live-in care suits Westbourne Park

No corner of Westminster takes our team longer to reach. A Westbourne Park Road address came out at over an hour on TfL's planner for a weekday 8am start, which is why short visits several times a day are hard to promise here. With a resident carer the arithmetic changes: someone is already in the flat for breakfast, for the lunchtime tablets, for a walk, and asleep down the hall at night. Broken nights are the exception, and those need a second pair of hands.

Finding the spare room

Expect the bedroom to be the sticking point. The 2021 Census found a spare room in roughly 26 of every 100 Westbourne ward households, near the bottom of Westminster's 18 wards, and social landlords housed more than half of them.

Where there is a room, it's usually in one of two places:

• Maisonettes and larger estate flats on the Brunel Estate, Westmead and Wessex Gardens, all built in the 1970s, where a son or daughter who has moved out may have left a room behind. Maisonettes split over two floors, so decide early which floor the person will sleep on.
• Victorian conversions along Westbourne Park Villas and the streets off it, where a second room sometimes sits half a flight from the first.

Weeks on a sofa bed won't do; the carer has to have a proper room. Where there's no second bedroom, we'd look instead at visits in Westbourne Park, if our rota can stretch to them. Tenants of the council or a housing association should let the housing officer know a carer is moving in. The carer acquires no claim on the home.

Lifts, stairs and equipment

Estate lifts set the limits for a profiling bed, a hoist or a wheelchair, and a lift that keeps failing can trap someone upstairs. Log every breakdown with the landlord and mention it to us so the plan has a fallback. Victorian staircases are often too narrow or curved for a stairlift. Jackie traces the path from the pavement to the bed and the bathroom when she visits, and a Westminster occupational therapist can be asked for through the council.

Dementia: the services on Westbourne Park Road

Number 42 Westbourne Park Road is where CNWL runs the borough's memory clinic, where Admiral Nurses advise relatives, and where a dementia day centre for older people operates. If the council agrees a day centre place, the hours someone spends there double as part of the live-in carer's rest. Clinic appointments are a stroll away, and the carer can sit in and jot down what the doctor says for the family.

How a changeover works

New carers turn up at Royal Oak or Westbourne Park station, or on foot from Paddington's Elizabeth line platforms. Some ride the 36 bus, which starts at New Cross and finishes up past Royal Oak and along the Harrow Road. Nobody leaves until the handover is done: tablets, timings, the next hospital date, and how the person likes their tea.

Driving in rarely pays. Westminster has no permits for visitors, only metered bays with a time limit, and the Kensington and Chelsea side reserves its permit bays for people who live there.

Green space for the carer's break

• The park at the centre of the Brunel Estate, with grassy mounds, sunken paths and mature trees, added to the national register of historic parks in 2020.
• Meanwhile Gardens, a canalside community garden just over the line in Kensington and Chelsea.
• Paddington Library, Porchester Road: step-free with a lift, so the person can come along.

Someone who can't be left needs company for those hours: family, a neighbour, or one of our sitting visits, which this far out we need to book well ahead.

Home from St Mary's

Admissions from here generally go to St Mary's in Paddington, a few stops on the 7, 23 or 36. A ward will often agree to discharge only if the patient won't be alone, and a carer moving in on day one meets that condition. Let us know the moment going home is mentioned. If the condition is mostly medical, ask the team whether the NHS Continuing Healthcare checklist has been done.

Cost and the council

You get our price on paper after Jackie's visit, whether the care is for one or two people. Both councils here assess through one shared adult social care service, and whichever council is responsible can release a personal budget as cash to spend with us. The detail is on the Westminster live-in care page.

How live-in care works →