We can totally relate to the care giver problem. Have not done a tally recently but we have probably easily interviewed 30 people over 12 months and half the allocated hours available to us a week are unfilled. We have our own collection of classic comments and I am sure you have your own. Some of my favourites are:
After being asked to wash my husbands neck as his head leans to the side and it gets sweaty: "Oh do you want me to dry it too!". Or a different carer "Oh do you want me to do BOTH sides?. Then we have to keep the shaving up especially because of the bipap masks and we use an electric razor. One asked "Do I use shave foam with the razor" the other with supposed many years of experience looked at it like alien technology and said I wouldn't know how to use that on ANOTHER person. Well, should I let a person who can't use an electric razor be in charge of non-invasive ventilation? However, my no 1 favourite comment was when my husband asked if he could have a drink of water. Answer: "Where do I get that?' So basically I do most of everything. Most worrying was though when I went down to the supermarket one afternoon and the carer knocked out the power lead to the bipap but did not realise this at the time. She only knew that the power off alarm was sounding. My husband cannot breathe lying down without the bipap. Well she jumped into action and switched on the back up bipap machine. Well that would have been helpful if she had connected the hose to the mask! There it was pumping away independently from helping him. He is shaking his head and she is saying oh don't you want the machine on? Finally she realised that the plug was out and finally he had air again. Then there was the carer last week, another reject, who just could not put the mask on his face (after two four hour shifts, the last of which we were continuously taking it off and putting it on because of sputum problems and it was a case of "I cant get it you do it"). She was saying well if he was sitting differently and his head wasn't so low and he wasn't having sputum problems and he didn't need to eat it would be better. Well sorry, but that is the way it is and I can't pick days for you to work when you won't have to do anything. Then there has been the parade of carers who are determined that the quattro mask, the easiest one to put on that we have, should really go on upside down and cannot be convinced otherwise!
The light in the end of the tunnel though is last week a carer started who will be doing 8 hours per week and she so far is just great. I would trade 8 hours with her for 20 with the others.
Sorry to go on and on but it is a real sore point with me,
Thanks
Chris