What respite care means
Respite care is a break for the family carer. Someone trained takes over looking after your parent for a while, so the person who usually does it can step away. The word respite simply means a rest or a pause.
In many Nigerian families, one person carries most of the care. Often it is the daughter who lives closest, a son who moved back home, or a wife looking after her husband. They do it out of love, and they rarely ask for help. But nobody can care for someone every day without a break and stay well.
Respite care in Lagos might be needed so that the family carer can:
- Rest properly, after months of broken nights and long days
- Travel for work, or take a holiday they have put off for years
- Attend a wedding, a funeral or a naming ceremony out of town
- Recover from their own illness, operation or a new baby
- Fly back abroad after visiting, knowing someone trained is with Mum or Dad
Your parent stays in their own home, with their own bed, their own food and the routines they know. The care continues. Only the person giving it changes for a while.
Signs the family carer needs a break
Carer burnout creeps up. It is easy to miss in yourself, and easy to miss in a brother or sister you only speak to on WhatsApp. These are some of the signs that whoever is caring for your parent needs a proper rest.
- They are tired all the time, even after a night's sleep
- They snap at your parent, or at everyone else, more than they used to
- They have stopped going to church, the mosque, the market or seeing friends
- Their own health appointments keep getting cancelled
- They feel guilty whenever they leave the house, even for an hour
- They say things like nobody else can do it, or I just have to manage
- Small mistakes are creeping in, such as a missed dose or a forgotten meal
Breaks matter for your parent too. A carer who is exhausted is more likely to make mistakes, to lose patience and eventually to become ill. Planned respite, taken before things reach breaking point, keeps the person at the centre of the care able to carry on.
Wanting a break is normal, and planning one is part of caring well for a long time.
An example visit
An illustration. Your parent's nurse plans the actual times and tasks with you at the assessment.
- On the first morning of respite cover, the caregiver arrives, clocks in on their phone at your parent's home and meets your sister before she leaves for the airport.
- Handover. Your sister walks through Mum's routine: where the medicines are kept, how she likes her pap, which neighbour has the spare key and who to call. The caregiver checks it against the care plan.
- Breakfast, then any readings the nurse has asked for, logged and checked against the safe ranges the nurse has set.
- Help with washing and dressing, if that is part of the plan, done the way Mum is used to.
- Lunch cooked from the notes the family left, eaten together at the table.
- A slow walk round the compound, or a video call with the grandchildren in Manchester.
- Evening medicines given exactly as prescribed in the care plan and recorded.
- The report is written. The nurse checks and signs it, and your sister can read it on the family portal wherever she is.
What respite care can look like
Respite care is built around what your parent needs and what the family carer normally does. There are two main forms, and the length and pattern of either are agreed with you at the assessment.
Daily visits. A caregiver comes to your parent's home at set times each day. This suits a parent who is fairly independent and mainly needs company, meals and someone to check on them, or who needs hands-on help at certain points in the day such as washing, dressing and the toilet.
Read about Companion Care: daily visits
Read about Personal Care: hands-on help
Live-in cover. A caregiver stays in your parent's home day and night for the period agreed. This suits a parent who should not be alone, including at night, which is often the case when the family carer has been living with them.
Read about Live-in Care in Lagos
Respite can be a single block of time, such as while someone travels, or a regular pattern, such as a set break each month. Some families use respite care as a first step and later keep the caregiver on. Whatever you choose, it is written into the care plan.
Planning ahead: December, Easter and owambe season
Respite care works best when it is planned. The busiest times are the ones families most often need cover for: the December rush, Easter, the long holidays, and the weekends when there is a wedding, a burial or a big birthday party in the village. If you know the dates, book early.
Before cover starts, a registered nurse visits your parent at home to assess them and write the care plan. If you are abroad you can join by video call. The plan covers what the caregiver will do, the medicines prescribed, the readings to take and the safe ranges for them.
Then comes the handover from the family carer. This is where the small things that make your parent comfortable are passed on. It helps to write them down.
- The daily routine: when Mum wakes, eats, rests and goes to bed
- Food: what she likes, what she will not eat, any diet the doctor has advised
- Medicines: the current prescriptions, where they are kept and the chemist or hospital pharmacy where they are bought
- Mobility: how she gets in and out of bed, the chair and the bath, and any aids she uses
- Moods and habits: what upsets her, what calms her, the songs or programmes she loves
- Who to call: family numbers, her doctor, the transport, the designated hospital and a trusted neighbour
- The house: keys, the generator, where the torch and rechargeable lamp are kept
What happens during respite
During respite care your parent has the same kind of care as any other family we look after. The caregiver follows the written care plan. A named registered nurse is responsible for your parent throughout.
- Caregivers clock in on their phone at your parent's home and the location is checked
- A report after every visit or night, checked and signed by the nurse before you read it on the family portal
- Readings checked against the safe ranges the nurse sets
- Only medicines prescribed in the care plan are given, and never injections
- Urgent alerts to the family, day or night
- Relief cover if a caregiver is sick or late
The family carer can switch off properly. They do not need to phone every few hours to check. If something needs their attention, they will be told, and otherwise the reports are there when they want to read them.
Before any caregiver works with a family, we check their identity document, a guarantor and two references.
Respite for families abroad
If you live in the UK, the US or Canada and a brother or sister in Lagos looks after Mum, respite care is one of the most useful things you can arrange from a distance. Your sibling may never ask for a break. You can offer one, organise it and share the cost, so they can travel, rest or deal with their own family.
Respite also helps when you fly home yourself. Many children abroad spend two or three weeks in Lagos, take over Dad's care, and then face the hard part: leaving again. Setting up respite cover before you fly back means the handover happens while you are still there. You meet the caregiver, walk through the routine together, and leave knowing that the first report will be on the family portal the next day.
Every signed report can be read by brothers and sisters wherever they live, so nobody has to relay messages across time zones.
Coming home after respite, and how to start
When the respite period ends, care is handed back to the family carer. They can read the reports from the time they were away, and the caregiver passes on anything that changed: a new habit, a dip in appetite, a reading the nurse is watching. If the nurse noticed something during respite that the family should know, they will tell you.
Sometimes respite shows that your parent needs more help than the family can give on its own. If so, the nurse will talk it through with you, and the plan can continue in a different form.
We do not publish prices. The cost of respite care depends on the form it takes, how long it lasts and where in Lagos your parent lives. You can pay by card or bank transfer.
It starts with a home assessment by a registered nurse, and within 48 hours you receive a written care plan and a quote. We cover Lagos Island and the Mainland. Abuja, Port Harcourt and Oyo State have a waiting list.
