Welcome to the latest edition of The Carer Digital!

Yesterday March 28 I attended a most informative Future of Care conference at London s King s Fund which is rather coincidental since we lead with the story/survey by King s Fund Their research highlights the public’s dissatisfaction, not only with social care, but another survey they conducted also highlights the public’s dissatisfaction with the NHS

The conference I attended had some of the industry s leading experts addressing the challenges changes and strategies for the future of the care sector

There were talks and panel discussions focusing on current trends within the sector funding risk in care management, Alzheimer’s care and much more

There were quite a few home truths delivered particularly from Prof Martin Green who highlighted that the sector had “been here many times before with solutions just tinkering around the edges

He described the current system as “not fit for purpose”, which is demonstrated in our lead story and the public s dissatisfaction with social care

I am hoping to get some (as many as possible) of the speakers to engage with us here at THE CARER and share their opinions and ideas on the future of adult social care

A key takeaway from a panel discussion was the sector ‘investing in the team’ Sadly public perception means that people see adult social care as a job and not a career and valuing the workforce empowering them providing clear career pathways and enhancing job satisfaction were all highlighted, as was placing adult social care on an equal footing as the NHS

Another key takeaway for me was the disparity between the NHS workforce and the social care workforce particularly when it came to the issue of mental health and support

Being a national institution the NHS has far better safety nets in place and provides better access to support for staff experiencing mental health issues than those in adult social care

But the NHS is a giant institution while there are over 18 000 independent adult social care organisations Many of these smaller organisations are simply not geared up to provide support and this can inevitably lead to burnout and moral injury

This is another area we hope very much to expand on include in forthcoming issues, so please do look out

One final fascinating aspect was a seminar entitled “Being a Good Neighbour” delivered by Ms Gea Sijpkes from a Dutch organisation called Humanitas Deventer I simply could not do it justice here suffice to say it was an enlightening seminar

The care home/facility invites students to live among elderly residents free of charge providing they give up 30 hours per month to help with elderly care

The student/resident program has proved to be a wonderful success and I suppose the way to describe it would be intergenerational living with people living as part of a community

Again I am hoping to introduce this to our readers in the coming months

Finally, one recurring theme amongst panel speakers was something I have often touched on here at THE CARER That is how mainstream media only appears to like and publicise negative aspects of the dedicated and hard-working sector, struggling and fighting on many fronts as opposed to printing the many positive aspects

As I say this is something I have spoken about for many years we here at THE CARER receive on a daily basis numerous heartwarming and feelgood stories from around the country involving staff residents and the wider community all taking part in wonderfully uplifting events which sadly never seem to get the light of day (other than us of course)

And one event we want you to share in particular with us is King Charles forthcoming Coronation!

Once again we were putting up a prize of a luxury hamper and we will be inviting you to share your celebrations events menus costumes anything you will be doing for the coronation and all you have to do is take some photographs send us a short story about how you plan the event and we will pick a winner!

And please follow us on Twitter We have hit the magic 10,000 followers, we are delighted to say and we want to get that up to 20 000! So please do follow us and encourage as many of your followers in the sector to follow us as well!

I can always be contacted at editor@thecareruk com