Cuts to Glasgow care at home services for frail and elderly people are set to cause further delayed discharges from hospitals - with the move described as “madness.”
There are 93,000 care at home visits a week in the city to help look after 5,000 people who are mostly aged over 70.
But now people leaving hospital or who get a community referral for the service and are classed as in substantial need are set to face a waiting list. And they must undergo a capacity-based model of provision.
READ MORE: Glasgow council supports asylum seekers getting right to work and free bus travel
A report said the change will “impact on this frail elderly vulnerable group” and hit “hospital discharge activity whereby patients may be delayed before returning home.”
Delays in people being discharged out of hospital because there isn’t suitable care available leads to vital beds becoming unavailable. Latest figures from last Tuesday showed there were 138 people delayed in hospital, a meeting heard.
The reduction in care at home comes despite an expected increased demand of seven per cent by 2023, the paper presented to last week’s Glasgow City Integration Joint Board meeting said.
The reduction won’t impact current service users, however.
The Glasgow City Integration Joint Board meeting considered equality impact assessments on a number of savings agreed as part of £42 million cuts for this financial year.
Speaking at the meeting, former paediatric surgeon Graham Haddock said he was slightly surprised to see the care at home saving proposed, particularly considering the “ongoing challenges we face in terms of hospital discharges.”
He added: “It doesn’t sit comfortably with me.”
Glasgow city health and social care partnership chief officer Susanne Millar said: “Broadly our budget gap was £42 million”
She added: “We are not necessarily going to be delivering the public services we would want to but we will deliver the best public service we can within the money we have available.”
Chris Sermanni, UNISON’s social work convenor in the city said: “It is madness to cut care at home services in Glasgow when the Scottish Government’s policy aim is to support people in their own homes to reduce hospital admissions or get people in hospital back home when their health allows.”
Equality impact assessments were also carried out on other savings, the meeting heard.
A two per cent reduction in the self directed support budget for adults and older people has the potential to have a “significant negative impact on equality, “ the report presented to the meeting said.
Forty three per cent of people getting self directed support have a learning disability, 13 per cent have a long-term mental health condition and 14 per cent have a physical disability according to the report.
The meeting heard Individual engagement is to take place with service users and the assessment will be updated. There is to be actions to mitigate the impact.
Day care centres for older people will see services run from Monday to Friday only instead of six to seven days.
The service is provided to 24 people at the weekends and most of them are aged 80 or above. People have been offered alternative days or different services.
Mr Sermanni added: “The cuts to care at home, day centres and disabled people’s services are to save around £3.5 million from the council’s budget. We are calling on Glasgow’s councillors to reverse these attacks on the most vulnerable in our city.
"These cuts are also counter-productive from a public finances point of view as they will lead to more pressure and costs on the NHS. Totally crazy. “
All the savings were approved.
READ NEXT:
Glasgow Provost tells off councillors for misbehaviour after meeting ends in chaos
Glasgow bid to home Ukrainian refugees as hundreds still in city hotels
More Glasgow people get jobs as 12,500 more workers recorded in employment rise
