RESPITE care to allow a break for people looking after sick relatives should be in their own locality, a Lampeter town councillor believes.

Cllr Dorothy Williams told colleagues that sending a Lampeter patient for respite care down to Haverfordwest would be counter-productive.

“It’s important that a carer has a respite to give them a break,” she said, “but if the person they’re looking after is sent down from Lampeter to, say, Haverfordwest, that to me is not a respite break.

“If I was their carer, I would be left feeling I’d have to travel all the way down there to visit them.”

She added that a secondary concern was patients from Aberystwyth accessing joint care beds at Lampeter’s Hafan Deg home – and vice-versa.

Cllr Williams made her comments during a discussion with Hywel Dda Health Board officials Jina Hawkes and Gareth Hughes last week.

Responding to her points, Mr Hughes said, while Hafan Deg had respite provision, access depended on accessibility and availability.

“What we are seeing is that respite requests for residential care have been quite low,” he said. “As far as people from outlying areas accessing beds at Hafan Deg is concerned it’s a question of availability – there’s no other way of addressing that.

“There are 10 joint care beds around the county. Every week, there are empty beds in residential care purely because people’s needs are changing.”

Ms Hawkes denied the number of joint care beds had been reduced in Ceredigion.

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