Got a few minutes? We’d highly recommend using them to read Sara Gowen’s fantastic blog post on her recent research, which posed the questions, ‘How can we prevent young carers undertaking inappropriate or excessive care?’ and, ‘What are the challenges, evidence and actions needed to ensure we are not relying upon children and young people to provide care?’.
We’ve included a small taster of Sara’s research below and you can read the full post here, on the Research in Practice website.
“Our research found that young carers are often holding responsibilities for caring for their family members 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days of the year. The young carers we talked to found night time caring responsibilities the most challenging, for example, the constant worrying, responsibility for checking on the cared for person, checking their home is safe and secured for the night. The disturbed nights and lack of sleep have a profound impact on young carers’ daily lives and especially on school days. We conclude that government needs to urgently ‘stop the clock’ on round the clock caring by young people through better monitoring, support and, where necessary, intervention.“