VIEWPOINT

First of all we here at THE CARER would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a slightly belated happy New Year in our first issue for 2023

Hopefully you are all aware that we produce a weekly digital edition distributed each Wednesday

You can sign up via our website www thecareruk com We are the only publisher that produces a full weekly edition of The Carer, keeping you up-to-date with all the latest news comment and opinion and products and services

We lead with the story surrounding the government s discharge fund which industry observers are rightly saying it is not enough and too little too late

According to the president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine up to 13,000 NHS patients which accounts for 13% of hospital beds are medically ready to leave hospital for having to stay because there is nowhere else for them to go

This has been a major problem for some time Each year thousands of patients have had to remain in hospital beds and faced a delayed discharge until the necessary next stage of care became available

Delays are attributed to the nonavailability of a temporary or permanent space in a care home rehabilitation unit or a small community hospital or may be due to a lack of a supportive care package for their return home

But as stated above this is nothing new and the care sector rightly expresses concerns that years of consistent underfunding has led us to the current crisis

As Mike Padgham CEO of the independent Care Group says in our lead article: An extra £250 million whilst welcome is not going to touch the surface in terms of tackling the overall crisis And my major fear is that we will get bogged down in bureaucracy as the £500 million to aid hospital discharged announce last September has become

I did spend some time researching as to how much of that money has been forthcoming and how it has been spent Casting our mind back to September 22, 2022 the £500m discharge fund, announced by then Health Secretary Theresa Coffey was specifically earmarked for moving people into care homes to recover from illness, freeing up space in hospital beds

I can find no record of whether it has been allocated whatsoever That’s not to say it hasn t but I just cannot find anything That of course makes for a lack of confidence in the new pledge of £250 million

Once again we will be very interested in your feedback!

I would also draw your attention to the results of our Christmas Hamper competition on pages 16-17 We are sorry we couldn t accommodate all the photographs we were sent, but this is just a selection of many of the wonderful nominations we received

We were so overwhelmed by so many wonderfully uplifting nominations that we tagged on five extra runners-up prizes - enough to get a bottle of champagne Just a gesture on our part to say thank you And watch out for our next issue, and our next competition for Easter!

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