I have been in hospital and I am returning home

Going into hospital can be a worrying experience, but there is help and advice available. You may be able to return home from hospital independently without any additional support.

If the ward staff think you'll need help once you get home, social care workers from Buckinghamshire Council can help you.

There are seven hospitals and community facilities in Buckinghamshire:

• Amersham Hospital
• Buckingham Community Hospital
• Chalfont and Gerrards Cross Community Hospital
• Marlow Community Hospital
• Stoke Mandeville Hospital
• Thame Community Hospital
• Wycombe Hospital

Find out more: information for patients and visitors (via Buckinghamshire NHS Healthcare Trust website).

To find out whether you need care and support after your discharge from hospital, you will need an assessment from adult social care. During an assessment, we'll review your needs to see what works best for you. We want to support you to live as independently as possible. This may be at home or in other suitable accommodation.

You, your family or carer can also request an assessment from us.

If you're a family carer, you can request a carer's assessment of your own needs. You can do this as part of the assessment of the person you care for.

We aim to support what works best for you when you're discharged from hospital.

We'll work closely with our NHS colleagues to find out what outcome you want, and help you achieve that outcome.

The services we consider together for you may include:

• domiciliary (home) care
• Home First care services
• assistive technology and equipment at home
• day care
• residential or nursing care
• respite care
• direct payments

We can arrange a temporary residential or nursing care bed for you on a short-term basis. This is after your discharge, while either:

• you wait for domiciliary services to become available
• decisions are made for your future long-term care

More information about your hospital stay is available from Ageuk.org.

Find out more about your stay