Adult social care and support

Adults entering or leaving hospital

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Getting ready to go into hospital

If you know you're going into hospital, the NHS has some useful advice:

You can also look at your stay in hospital from Age UK.

If you need help getting to your appointment, find out about:

Emergency admissions

You could prepare for an emergency with the Message in a bottle scheme. This gives you stickers that will let people know if you have allergies or take medicine.

In an emergency we must consider if we need to make arrangements for you to:

  • make sure your property is secure
  • check if someone can take care of your pets. If you don't have family or friends that can help we will arrange a cattery, kennel or similar

You may have to pay for us to make these arrangements.

Caring for someone else

If you look after someone else, do you have plans for them if you need to go into hospital? The carer's emergency plan can help you prepare.

Action for Carers has Hospital Carer Support Advisors at:

  • East Surrey
  • Epsom and St. Heliers
  • The Royal Surrey
  • Ashford and St. Peter's

They offer advice and support and make sure that you're involved in all conversations.

Ask hospital staff about extra help to carers through a Carers Passport. This may help you get:

  • cheaper parking
  • longer visiting hours
  • continue to care for your loved one

A Carer's assessment can tell you if you can get help to support you. If you need more support ask for a review. See looking after family or friends.

If the person you care for has dementia, ask your hospital team about the Butterfly Scheme.

See also our Carers' hospital discharge guide.

During your stay

Our social care staff work together with hospital staff and community health providers. They will give you advice about getting ready to leave hospital when you are medically fit. The hospital staff will arrange any care and support needs before discharge.

Getting ready to go home

You can find advice about being discharged from hospital (NHS) or on leaving the hospital from AgeUK Surrey. You can also find out more advice about your discharge on the individual hospital websites:

The Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS) at the hospital you are in will be able to give you a copy of their discharge policy.

Leaving hospital

When you're ready to leave, our teams will work with you to make sure you can do this safely. They will look to see if:

  • you can go straight home
  • you can go home with some support
  • you need to go into community-based care or temporary residential or nursing care
  • you need to go into long-term residential or nursing care

You can find out more about what will happen at being discharged from hospital (NHS).

Go home with social care support

If you need care and support when you go home, you need to get this set up before you leave. To find out if you, or someone you know, can get help from us, complete our self-assessment form. See Assessments and eligibility to find out more.

If you can get support from us, our teams will talk to you about this. You do not need to pay anything towards your care and support until we have completed a full assessment of your care needs.

We will help you get home or in a temporary care home first while you continue your recovery, then work with you to set up relevant care and support to meet your needs and help you stay independent. You may hear professionals call this 'discharge to assess'.

To find out more see:

Going into residential or nursing care

If you have ongoing and more complex needs that cannot be managed at home you may need support in a residential or nursing care home. You may need to pay towards longer term care.

See:

Arranging your own care

If you can't get support from us, there's lots of support in local areas provided by a range of different organisations.

Homesafe Plus is for people in Elmbridge, Runnymede, Spelthorne, Woking or Surrey Heath areas.

It offers immediate support for 6 weeks. You may have to pay for this. Examples include:

  • fitting key safes
  • meals at home
  • community alarms
  • social prescribing service

The Hospital to Home Support Service is for people in the Surrey Downs area.

It offers support for 6 weeks. You may have to pay for this.

Examples include:

  • Lifeline alarm
  • telephone welfare calls
  • referrals to different services and social activities

For help with everyday tasks find out about:

Making changes to your home could help keep you safe, well and independent. Find out about:

Money and benefits

If you get benefits, you must tell:

  • Department for Work and Pensions (DWP)
  • the council office that deals with your Housing and Council Tax Benefit claims

about your hospital stay. They will check to see if you they need to make any changes to your benefits.

If you didn't have any benefits before you went into hospital, you may be able to claim now. Get advice on benefits and money from Citizens Advice.

For help with travel costs see:

If something goes wrong

If you're not happy with:

  • your stay
  • how you left hospital

speak with your hospital team. You can get help to do this from The Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS).

You can give feedback about us or provide independent feedback via Healthwatch Surrey.

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