26 March 2024
The final documentary by Kate Garraway about her late husband’s health challenges following his hospitalisation with COVID-19, ‘Kate Garraway: Derek’s Story’, will be shown on ITV1 on Tuesday 26 March at 9pm.
Commenting ahead of the broadcast, Kathryn Smith, Chief Executive Officer of the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE), the only charity interviewed for the programme, said:
This documentary is a powerful tribute to Derek Draper and Kate also bravely throws back the curtain on the reality of caring for a person with complex needs.
Social care can be life-changing, but as Kate showed, the system can also be complicated, challenging to navigate and expensive. Sadly, we know that many families have a similar experience and can struggle to afford or provide the care that their loved ones need.
“Thousands of people, like Kate, take on a caring role for their loved one, either by choice or by need. However, the unrelenting nature of being an unpaid carer, while also juggling a full- or part-time job and raising a family, as many must do, can have a profound effect on their physical and emotional wellbeing.
“We urgently need social care reform to help transform services for the people who need them, including unpaid carers. Pay and working conditions must be addressed if we are going to recruit more social care professionals and retain our workforce, and we must ensure all unpaid carers are recognised and supported to help them continue caring for the ones they love.”