Hospital discharge at short notice.
The ward confirms that a parent can come home tomorrow provided care is arranged. We assess on the ward, agree a plan with the discharge team, and have a carer ready for the first day at home.
Care in 24 to 48hFrom first call
Emergency care
Emergency home care
across Surrey.
A hospital discharge tomorrow, a fall last night, or a carer who has become unavailable: one call to our Surrey care team and emergency home care can be in place within 24 to 48 hours, anywhere in Surrey, from Surrey to Surrey.
Care within 24 to 48 hours
CQC rated Good
No emergency premium
Local team · No call centres
“Praised the carers' support through her mother's hospital discharge and the transition back home.” — J H, verified review, homecare.co.uk
When care can't be planned
Emergency home care arranged quickly.
Most families plan care over a period of weeks. Some are given no such opportunity: a fall, a sudden diagnosis, a family carer taken ill, or a hospital ready to discharge tomorrow provided that care is in place. Emergency home care exists for those situations. It is a fully regulated care package arranged in days rather than weeks, by a local Surrey team who answer the telephone themselves.
Situations we step into
Situations that require emergency home care.
The following are the calls our Surrey care team receives and resolves each week.
A fall or a sudden decline.
A fall, an infection or a difficult weekend can change the position entirely. We put support in place quickly, so that a recurrence does not happen with nobody present.
Your usual carer is unavailable.
A private carer has resigned, gone on holiday, or stopped attending. We bridge the gap within days, for a week or on a permanent basis.
The family carer has been taken ill.
When the husband, wife, son or daughter providing the care becomes unwell, two people need support at once. We take on the caring role immediately.
An arrangement that has broken down.
An agency that repeatedly misses visits, or a placement that is not working. We can take over an existing care plan quickly and stabilise the situation.
Rapid deterioration in a condition.
Dementia, Parkinson's disease or frailty that has worsened suddenly. We increase support quickly, with extra visits, night cover or live-in care within days.
How fast care actually starts
From first call to carer at the door.
Emergency home care follows the same four stages, compressed into hours rather than weeks.
1
Hour one: your call is answered.
Your call is answered by a member of the care team at one of our Surrey bases rather than a call centre. We establish what has happened and what is needed.
2
Same day: the free assessment.
A free assessment at home or on the hospital ward, frequently the same day, so that nothing delays discharge or leaves anyone unsupported.
3
Within 24 to 48 hours: care begins.
A matched, DBS-checked carer starts work, briefed on the care plan, medication and routines before arriving. Even at short notice it is clear who is at the door, since every Aims carer arrives in our green uniform.
4
Week one: reviewed and stabilised.
We review what is working, adjust the care plan, and settle it into a routine the family can rely on, or wind it down if it was only ever intended as a bridge.
From first call to carer at the door: usually 24 to 48 hours.
Why speed matters
What the evidence shows about delays.
The days without support following a fall or a hospital discharge are when the greatest harm occurs. The evidence below sets out why.
Falls and emergency hospital admissions.
Around a third of people aged 65 and over fall at least once a year, and in a single year there were around 220,000 emergency hospital admissions related to falls among over-65s in England, around two-thirds of them people aged 80 and over (Office for Health Improvement & Disparities). After a first fall, the days before support is in place are exactly when the next one tends to happen.
The danger of the "long lie".
The risk lies not only in the fall itself but in the period spent on the floor afterwards. In one study of older people admitted after a fall, half of those who had lain on the floor for an hour or more died within the following six months, even without a direct injury from the fall (Wild et al., British Medical Journal, 1981). Having someone in the home, or visiting daily, is the surest protection against a long lie.
Delayed discharges from acute hospitals.
In January 2026, an average of around 13,750 patients a day in England's acute hospitals were ready to leave but delayed (NHS England discharge data, analysed by the Nuffield Trust), often because care wasn't yet in place at home. Confirming a care package quickly is frequently the single thing that unlocks a discharge, and every extra day in a hospital bed costs strength an older person can't spare.
We therefore work to a realistic 24 to 48 hours from the free assessment: quickly enough to close the period of risk, and carefully enough to send an appropriate carer who has been properly briefed.
Emergency home care
at £36.95/hour
The same transparent rates as planned care: 30-minute visits at £29.95, 1-hour visits at £36.95. We never charge an emergency premium for urgent starts, and the same rates apply 7 days a week. Every price is a "from" rate: your exact written quote is confirmed at your free, no-obligation assessment at home or on the ward. No call-out fees, no hidden charges.
One call, and the logistics transfer.From that point the arrangements are our responsibility.
What changes when you call
What we take on when you call.
In a care crisis the difficulty is rarely any single task; it is managing all of them simultaneously. One telephone call transfers the logistics to us, so that the family can return to being family.
- Medication managed: prescriptions, prompts and records
- Equipment and home setup arranged before day one
- Routines rebuilt around how your relative lives
- Family updated after every visit, from the first
Praised the carers' support through her mother's hospital discharge and the transition back home.
"The team that cares for me are timely, caring, and supportive."
Rated 9.5/10 from 58 reviews. Read all our verified reviews on homecare.co.uk.
Emergency care questions
Common questions about emergency care.
Usually within 24 to 48 hours of your free assessment, and we can frequently assess on the same day you call. What we will not do is send an unbriefed carer to the door within two hours. A rushed start with the wrong carer creates more difficulty than it resolves. Call us on 01372 386222 and we will give you a realistic timeline during that call.
Yes. Falls and hospital discharges do not keep to office hours. Our carers work seven days a week, and urgent starts can be arranged over a weekend, including Friday afternoon hospital discharges, which are among the most frequent calls we take.
Yes, and it is among the most common situations we handle. We can assess your relative on the ward, agree a plan directly with the hospital discharge team, and confirm in writing that care is arranged, which is generally what the ward requires in order to discharge. Care is then in place from the moment they return home.
Yes. There is no long-term contract. Many families use emergency home care for a few weeks after a hospital stay, or while a family carer recovers, and then stop once the situation has settled. Where ongoing support proves useful, the same team continues. Our short-term live-in care covers longer bridging periods.
No. Emergency care costs the same as planned care: 30-minute visits at £29.95 and 1-hour visits at £36.95, the same rates Monday to Sunday (Bank Holidays are charged at double the standard rate), with the same free assessment and exact written quote confirmed at your home or on the ward. Some providers add an emergency premium for a fast start. We do not, because a family in crisis should not pay more for urgency.
Nothing formal is required. It helps if you can describe what has happened, what support you think is needed, any medication involved, and, for a discharge, which hospital and ward. Please do not wait until you have everything to hand: our office team will ask the necessary questions and proceed from there.
Related services
Other home care services we provide.
Local to you
Emergency and same-week home care across Surrey.
Aims Homecare has arranged urgent home care across Surrey for more than 15 years, from our office on Kingston Road in Leatherhead. Our team provides emergency care in Surrey, same-week home care, hospital discharge care and rapid-start visiting care. Because we are a local home care agency rather than a national franchise with a call centre, the person who answers your call is the person who arranges your care, and your carer lives nearby. Urgent home care starts at £36.95 per hour with no emergency premium; see our home care pricing for full details and funding options.
An urgent start often settles into something steadier. Families who first call us in a crisis frequently move on to regular hourly care, add night care after a fall, or bridge a recovery with short-term live-in care. Whether the situation is a sudden hospital discharge in Surrey, a carer who has let you down, or a difficult weekend, call 01372 386222 and we will take it from there.