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Understanding your parent's care plan, together
A care plan sets out the help agreed with your parent. What one usually covers, how your parent shapes it, and who else gets to read it.
"It's in the care plan," says the voice from the agency. Nobody in your family has read it. This is information, not medical advice. It does not go through what any plan ought to contain, and it makes no judgement on your parent's; that belongs to your parent and the people who drew it up with them. The sections below cover what a care plan is in general terms, how your parent shapes it, and who else gets to read it.
Start from the plan as your parent's own
Begin any conversation about the plan with your parent, before you take it to the provider. The family can learn all it needs of the plan from your parent, or from a call with the provider that your parent has invited you to.
HIQA's evidence review for home care standards in Ireland sees the person as a partner in their own care, and says providers should show how they will find out how far that person wants to be one, and to make their own care choices. The same review says the person's knowledge, values, skills and culture should be reflected in their care and support plan.
What we don’t claim here
We don’t tell you whether a change is serious, or where ordinary ends and concerning begins. No authority sets that threshold, so we don’t imply one.
Who can weigh it: your parent’s doctor or care team, who know the person and the situation. Where to take it →
Learn what a plan usually sets out
In NICE's guidance on adult social care in England, a care and support plan is a written plan, made after an assessment, that sets out the person's care and support needs, how those needs will be met, including what the person or anyone who cares for them will do, and what services they will receive. NICE's home care guidance for England adds that a plan should be clear, concise and easy to find your way around, with a summary at the start and links through to the detail. NICE's information for the public on home care in England says the care a person gets should be written down in a care plan that is easy to understand, in a format that suits them, such as large print.
Those descriptions come from England. What a plan is called, and who draws it up, differ by where your parent lives. If the plan stops fitting, Asking for your parent's care to be looked at again is about asking for it to be looked at again.
Ask, with your parent, whether a copy can be shared
In NICE's home care guidance for England, a copy of the home care plan should go to unpaid carers such as family with the person's permission, while the person should have their own copy in a format that meets their needs.
If your parent would like one of you to have a copy, the two of you can ask the provider together.
Help your parent shape it, if they want help
NICE's adult social care guidance for England asks for the plan itself to say clearly how far the person wants others involved, whether unpaid carers, family, friends or an advocate.
Ask your parent what they would like help with: putting a preference into words, being there when the plan is talked through, or nothing at all. Helping with the plan means helping your parent say what they want, not checking the carers' work against it. Respecting their independence and choices has more on keeping decisions with your parent.
When it comes to the choices written into the plan, whether a parent is able to make a particular decision for themselves is not something a family is asked to settle on its own; where that is in question, it is for their doctor or care team, and the formal side differs by where your parent lives.
Take questions about your parent's health and care needs to their doctor or care team
Anything in or around the plan that touches your parent's health is worth bringing to their doctor or care team, and your parent can lead that conversation as far as they wish. Questions about how the plan is kept, and who has a copy, can go to the provider with your parent.
When to ask a professional
This guide stops where a professional’s judgment starts. Bring what you’ve noticed, plainly, to your parent’s doctor or care team.
Sources
The outside sources this guide draws on.
Primary: Taken from the official source itself, and cited directly. Secondary: Established in recognised guidance, summarised here.
- PrimaryNICE (England), People's experience in adult social care services (NG86), Terms used in this guideline: Care and support plan, and recommendation 1.3.12, 20 February 2018
- PrimaryNICE (England), Home care: delivering personal care and practical support to older people living in their own homes (NG21), recommendations 1.3.13 and 1.3.21, 17 September 2015
- PrimaryNICE (England), Home care for older people: what you should expect, information for the public, 17 September 2015
- SecondaryHIQA (Ireland), executive summary of the evidence review for National Standards for Homecare and Support Services in Ireland, 2022
More in this department
How we source
Carefulness, made visible.
Named, not counted
Each guide names its sources and tags each one Primary or Secondary. It never counts sources at you.
Holding back
Where a part isn’t confirmed, a guide runs shorter and says what is missing.
Naming the limit
Every guide names where its authority ends, and who to ask instead.