Brian Egan
Managing Director, Bluebird Care (Carlow/Kilkenny & Waterford & Tipperary/East Cork)
Specialist nurses support community carers as they help loved ones receive the best care and support while remaining in their own homes.
Community personnel enable home care with a backup team of nurses on hand if the unforeseen happens. Brian Egan, Managing Director of Bluebird Care (Carlow/Kilkenny and Waterford and Tipperary/East Cork) believes the tier of nursing staff to support community carers also ensures that services delivered — whether complex individual care or basic support — remain safe and timely. Pointing to the value of the nurse-led care system his organisation delivers, he says it is an important component of how community care has evolved in Ireland over the past decade.
Nurse-led care system
Egan says: “We believe that with the right risk assessment, care plan and suitably-trained staff, anybody can stay at home, whatever their needs.” Nurses conduct the risk assessments and deliver more complex care, with community carers meeting needs that allow older people to stay in their own homes.
Bluebird Care nurse managers liaise with HSE (Health Service Executive) Community Nursing teams and hospital discharge teams while providing a high level of support to community carers. “It is a bigger investment to have a team of nurses, but it gives reassurance to families and carers,” he continues. “Home is where people thrive and want to be, but that choice has not always been there.”
Home is where people thrive
and want to be, but that choice
has not always been there.
HSE partnership: choice of home care
Home care has become an essential aspect of community care in Ireland. Your loved ones deserve the option to either remain at home or transition to a nursing home when facing care needs.
Working under the HSE framework means teams deliver care efficiently and give people the choice to stay at home, he says. Emphasising the HSE partnership with Bluebird Care, he says a Statutory Support Scheme will further underpin that choice, particularly with formal regulation of home care services pending.
Meaningful home care delivery
Home care can make a meaningful impact on people’s lives. For example, a woman who feared falling while washing and dressing regained confidence with a few care visits per week, easing her own and her family’s concerns. In another case, a man with locked-in syndrome and significant care needs received a home care package, allowing him to live at home with his family instead of in hospital.
A strength of Bluebird Care is having a strong office, admin and support team to maintain continuity of service. Egan says: “We are unique because we are a nurse-led team with clinical managers locally, which gives extra reassurance to our clients and those we work with in the HSE. Another key focus for Bluebird Care is to ensure carers feel they are working for a good employer that supports them on an ongoing basis.”
