Please give carers a chance to shine (From Gazette Series)

Please give carers a chance to shine

I FEEL that I must put pen to paper following your headlines regarding Care Services changes (Gazette, June 10).

I myself am a carer for Gloucestershire County Council and would just like to say that along with some other carers I feel very upset by this headline.

I am the first to admit that I, myself, was not happy with the changes that were being implemented as I also have built up relationships with my service users.

However I look beyond this and see that these changes are going to improve the service that we are going to be able to provide.

I appreciate that service users get attached to their carers, as do we to them, but we as carers have to be professional about this, we are employed by the county council and are employed to provide a service as in any job or profession.

I feel very sorry that service users are upset by these changes but would like them to see things from the carers points of view.

We as carers from the county council are all trained to National Care Standards and many of us have also gained our NVQ's in care work, our training is updated annually. We are all therefore working to the same levels and standards and should not be made to feel discriminated against as one carer being any better than another, and not knowing what to do. Granted it will take a while to pick up on the routine and personal preferences and ways that individuals like things to be done, but we are all capable of doing this and are both caring and compassionate to every service user.

I would like to thank you for printing this letter giving the other side of the story.

We, as carers, are proud to work for the Home Care Service and hope that in time the service users will find the changes beneficial providing them with a service they are proud to receive.

Lynn Browning A Proud Home Care Carer Dursley