Extra 70,000 care home places needed by 2025 as demand soars

MORE than 70,000 extra care home places will be needed by 2025, with pensioners now spending twice as long living without independence, a study in the The Lancet suggests.

Women over the age of 65 can now expect to spend the last three years of their lives in a care home, or receiving help several times daily, the research shows. Two decades ago, they could expect to spend the last 18 months of their lives in need of such help.

The average man will receive such care for the last two and a half years of his life when, 20 years earlier, they could expect to spend just over a year in need of such assistance.

Sir Andrew Dilnot, of Oxford University, who led a report on reform of elderly care, said the research showed an urgent need for a substantial investment in services, with too many pensioners left living in fear that the costs would overwhelm them.

The research led by Newcastle University said there would be 253,000 more older people with medium or high care needs by 2025. While half of these people will live at home, the researchers believe an extra 71,215 care home spaces will be needed. The study found that gains in life expectancy meant people were spending longer living with higher levels of frailty.

Researchers compared data from two studies, each with more than 7,500 participants aged 65 and older, conducted in 1991 and 2011.

They found that those in most need were far less likely to be living in a care home than used to be the case. The percentage of adults aged 85 who required help round the clock who were living in a care home fell from 73.5 per cent to 51.8 per cent over the period.

Professor Carol Jagger, the lead author from Newcastle University, said: “Older people today are spending more of their remaining life with care needs.

“This finding, along with the increasing number of older adults with higher rates of illness and disability, is contributing to the current social care crisis.” A Department of Health spokesman said: “High quality care isn’t just about care home beds – 61 per cent of people are cared for in their own home and since 2010 there has been a growth in home care agencies of more than 2,900.

“We’ve given local authorities an extra £2billion boost over the next three years to maintain access for our growing ageing population and to put the social care sector on a sustainable footing.”