“This is your home, stay here” – Home Instead Salford sheds light on care problem with new TV campaign

A Salford healthcare organisation is hoping to “change the way that we conceptualise getting older” through a new national TV campaign.

This comes after Home Instead Senior Care recently launched their TV advert, ‘The Third Stair’. The advert centres around recently widowed Stanley, who faces the prospect of having to leave his family home.

He reminisces over memories with his wife, and focus is on the creaky third stair he never got around to fixing.

The two and-a-half minute advert is the first national campaign for Home Instead and will run for four weeks across UK television’s main channels.

Home Instead Salford’s directors Jo Shaugnessy and Susan Robinson established the Salford branch in 2016, after a search for adequate care for Susan’s mother ended unsuccessfully.

“We needed care for Susan’s mum,” Miss Shaugnessy said. “We couldn’t find it. We couldn’t find a level of responsibility of care for someone who’s essentially everything to us. We met with Home Instead Senior Care and they asked for our postcode. They said they can’t service that.

“We are proud Salfordians and Mancunians, so we were disappointed that we didn’t have the degree of choice that other places have.”

Miss Robinson felt she was compelled to start the Salford branch began following a meeting with directors at the organisation’s Warrington headquarters.

She hopes that The Third Stair will help “shed light on an overlooked minority who face a an awful reality.

“What the advert is saying is ‘this is your home, stay here.’ Home Instead is trying to change the way we conceptualise getting older and what the choices are. The primary one will always be to stay in your own home.”

Despite her optimism, Miss Shaugnessy understands the negative perception of the care industry, especially towards caregivers themselves.

“Caregiving is generally seen as a very low-level, low entry, basic kind of profession for people to go into unfortunately.

“You’re adapting yourself to deal with scared, vulnerable individuals often. It’s our role to make them feel supported, loved, and happy in the environment that they’re in,” she added.

“The people that work for us are tremendously skilled, and that should be respected as part of the industry.”

Miss Shaugnessy believes that the needs of the care industry are not currently being properly addressed.

She wants those in charge to be more considerate of those that require help, but understands that this is a problem that many won’t empathise with until they experience it first-hand.

Home Instead Salford also helps run community projects such as dementia friends; a small gathering that encourages those living with dementia to interact with others.

“Yesterday, we had a big dementia friends session open to the community. Jo and I give a long talk. Once we complete the talk, we encourage them to take 5 key things from it, then they become a dementia friend,” Mrs Robinson said.

“The whole country has collectively managed to get 3 million dementia friends. When I was growing up, if you saw somebody behaving differently in the street, you’d have no idea what it was.

“If you’d know how to look after someone with it, then it makes everyone’s life a lot better.”

Home Instead Senior Care recently finished promoting Malnutrition Awareness Week.

You can follow Home Instead Salford on Facebook @homeinsteadsalford and find out more about old age statistics here.