Contact the Elderly

Hollybeech House

1 Hall Gardens

Kildwick

BD20 9AF

Tel: 01535 632592

Email:

Website:

Contact: Mary Robinson

Contact the Elderly was established in 1965 to relieve the acute loneliness of frail, very older people living alone with limited or inadequate social support.

Founded in London it spread via Scotland and Yorkshire. We now have groups in every region of England as well as Wales and Scotland.

Our service is perhaps more vital now than at any other time, as life expectancy grows and patterns of family life change, increasing numbers of older people find themselves living alone.

Through our volunteer network, we offer a simple yet hugely effective act of friendship, providing a lifeline, as each month volunteer drivers take otherwise-housebound older guests to the home of volunteer hosts, where all enjoy the warmth of friendship for a few hours.

Whilst we work closely with numerous statutory and voluntary organisations concerned with older people, our service remains unique:

We provide a group activity that encourages:

discrete regular monitoring of the health and welfare of particularly vulnerable people

relationships to develop between older group members and volunteers

inter-generational links

We operate at weekends when most other services for older people are not available and Sundays can therefore be a particularly lonely day of the week, especially for older people who live alone. Many volunteers are unable to help within their community during the working week. Our volunteering opportunities also fit in with a busy working life.

We offer private hospitality, often within a family environment - a rare alternative to the institutional day or residential care usually available to frail, older people.

Increasingly, evidence shows that loneliness and the associated social isolation of older people plays a pivotal role, affecting both their physical and mental health.

Social Services and other health providers use our services for older clients, especially depressed by isolation, knowing that it may help reverse the condition.