How are paid caregivers doing?

Like you, I went into the vocation after caring for my mother.

The job, I absolutely love. In two and a bit years I have never been bored, never not wanted to go to work that day, never even longed for the working day to end. It's the world's best and most useful job. Seriously.

The way I and my co-workers are treated, now. Alas that is a different question - and as far as I can tell from meeting private sector caregivers in our area, our public sector organisation is *good* by comparison. People are leaving social care because, the politicians and media say, "they can earn more stacking shelves in the supermarket." Tosh. Utter rubbish.

It is true that the money is a joke, if not an insult. But nobody worth his or her salt was doing this job for the money anyway, and that isn't why they're leaving.

It's because the employers - agencies, social care providers, whoever - tender for contracts competitively, which means they propose a low cost. To stay in business, they then have to meet their key performance indicators within that low cost; and their biggest expense by far is workers' time. So the time allocated to client visits is restricted, the time allowed for travel between clients is always slightly undercut, and the tasks and routines required in each visit - don't fit. It's that simple.

So the basics, such as washing your hands, donning new PPE, introducing yourself, checking the support plan, giving the client time to prepare, encouraging the client to do as much as possible with your assistance, tidying up after yourself, recording and reporting concerns, establishing trust, listening to people - these are all still on the list of requirements (along with driving carefully, staying hydrated, taking allocated breaks, doing your online training). But nobody can actually do them. There isn't time. It isn't an excuse, there *really* isn't time. If you take the time, as I stubbornly do, you get given a performance improvement plan and ripped a new one.

When there are then complaints, as well there might be, and I've lost count of how many I've nipped in the bud by apologising on behalf of others, who gets the blame? Yup. The caregivers.

I partnered a 22 year old girl on a 2:1 round last week. She is working her behind off. She is bright and efficient, kind, dedicated. Thanks largely to her we made good time on a round which was not technically feasible at all. She broke speed limits wherever possible in the 120 mile round trip. She observed nothing (I could almost hear her grinding her teeth when I documented early stage pressure areas on a body map). It isn't for me to correct or instruct her so I tried to hold my tongue, but when she was about to hand medications to a client we'd just changed I could stand it no longer and told her she must change her gloves. "I did!" she exclaimed, and I don't doubt that she did; only, of course, what she should have done is wash and dry her hands in between. Well, now. Two or three minutes is a long time in a 30 minute bed call.

Earlier today I suggested to a different co-worker, who's been doing this job for 20 or more years, that the reason some clients' families don't leave adequate supplies of items such as laundry detergent, toilet paper, bath towels where we can find them is that they think we'll waste them or steal them. She stared at me. "Do they really think that badly of us?" she said. I told her about the pillowcase incident on this very forum: two new pretty pillowcases went missing, and the OP's very first thought, her automatic assumption, was that the caregivers had stolen them; and she clung to that belief even after one of the items had turned up safe and well among the clean laundry.

Caring is very emotionally exhausting, but it isn't the clients who break your heart.

I've never been a paid caregiver but I do have some advice for those of you who are. In my experience the best caregivers understand the need to "put on your own oxygen mask first", becoming overly empathetic and involved inevitably leads to burn out (and often isn't appreciated by the family of the care recipient).