joenorth

Thanks for the pointers, much appreciated.

Can anybody recommend a joiner/builder who might take on small internal house modifications? Thanks for any tips,

Thanks, that's good to hear.

Anybody ever made use of this company to buy a car? If you have, what were your experiences of them?

Thanks very much for your kind interest, but now sorted for someone to look after dog

Would anybody be interested in looking after our nice doggie for a couple of weeks while we're away from Shetland? Happy to pay for her keep.

Can anyone recommend someone reliable who could replace a kitchen sink, fit a new window, and who might tackle a couple of other small household jobs? The bigger firms are all very occupied with bigger jobs, it seems. Grateful for any pointers.

Aimee Sutherland, who stays in Russell Crescent.

Recently bought polycarbonate roofing sheets. The price Hays gave was almost a third of the price from LBC, so went with Hays!

I've got Jim's Garage to wire up a couple of towbars for me- I'm frightened to touch modern car electrics!

The thing is, there isn't a move towards 'village' style accommodation in this country. There is a consensus that long-term care provided in smaller units is best, but this is not borne out in reality. Care homes are getting bigger: when I say that, I mean bigger, more faceless, more 'institutional'. Many of the criticisms made by Goffman in 'Asylums' still relate to these. Glad your mum's experience is positive. Should be the norm!

Apologies-I've deleted my double post. Getting carried away!

Sadly, overall, the opposite is true. The NHS Information Services Divisions 2010 census of care homes in Scotland shows a decrease in the number of private care homes in Scotland between 2000 and 2010, but an increase in the number of places. This signifies the building of bigger and bigger homes. Service providers do this to achieve 'economies of scale': that is, the more residents you can squeeze under one roof the smaller and cheaper your workforce can be. Other 'hotel' services such as kitchens and laundry can be concentrated on one site and will also be cheaper. There are no fixed requirements for staff/resident ratios in the UK, so the temptation exists for private employers to pare staff numbers to the bone. The bulk of private care providers pay close to minimum wage. This is translating across the UK into 'granny farming'. The warehousing of residents in big, shared living areas detracts from quality of life. In the case of people with dementia, it is actively condemned in the research literature. However, the evidence is broadly ignored by private care providers. In addition, the British Geriatrics Society point out the poor financial state of many of the larger care home chains, and consider that more of them will go into administration in the next few years (Argus Care and Southern Cross have gone already, of course). As such private providers are the major players in the long-term care sector, this is a situation which could well result in the government having to pick up the ball in the future (think RBS). I can describe numerous positive aspects of the private care home experience I've witnessed, and numerous negative aspects of local authority- run homes. We can all make points based on our personal experience. However, in thinking about the overall picture, residents in local authority- run homes are likely to have a better quality of life than those in private homes. The former will be looked after by happier, better paid staff in units which tend to be smaller and therefore more person-centred. The literature bears this out. A book which illustrates this very well is 'NHS Plc' by Prof. Alyson Pollock (you can see excerpts of it on Google books)

I think there's a bit of a focus on selective issues here. You're right enough, Viewforth will never be as suitable for purpose as a unit specially designed from the word go. I don't hear anybody speaking about that anymore, though. The fact is that Viewforth is a much better environment for people with dementia and behavioural issues than anywhere else in Shetland. Unless it is replaced with something appropriate -not simply closed- service provision will suffer. Thanks for the offer of information. If you're party to knowledge that a new specialist dementia unit features as a priority in the SICs capital planning, that's great. It's all I want to know. Could you divulge that fact on Shetlink, if you have it? Paul, I have to agree with you. The idea that murdering older people (or anybody) is any sort of a joke is bloody awful. No internet forum should suffer offensive (and irrelevant to topic) sh*te like this.

Do you think so? The old Ronas Ward would have to be completely gutted and rebuilt to meet the compulsory standards for mainstream care homes, let alone specialist dementia units. It's a pretty decrepit old hospital ward, complete with large shared rooms. It would be nice if they did replace Viewforth with something similar, and until council 'austerity' that was the accepted plan. All I hear now, though, is 'close it'! No talk of a direct replacement. As for scaremongering: this scenario is pretty scary, and that's a plain fact.