392 care employers in Suffolk could find you

Working in care in Suffolk

Ipswich, the market towns and the Heritage Coast: where do Suffolk carers work?

Suffolk is a county of one sizeable town and a lot of smaller ones. Ipswich has the biggest share of care employers by a distance, then Bury St Edmunds and Lowestoft, followed by Sudbury, Felixstowe, Stowmarket, Haverhill and Woodbridge. Just over half of the employers are home care agencies, and in a county this rural many of their clients live in villages some way from those towns.

The east of the county is noticeably older. In East Suffolk, which runs from Lowestoft down through Southwold, Aldeburgh and Woodbridge to Felixstowe, the median age reached 49 at the 2021 census, nine years above England. Over the same decade the number of residents aged 65 to 74 there rose by 23 per cent, while people aged 35 to 49 fell by almost 16 per cent. More older people and fewer working age adults is a combination that makes carers who live locally especially valuable along the coast.

With direct payments from Suffolk County Council, people can either take on a personal assistant as an employee or pay a self-employed PA, and a support provider helps them work out tax, National Insurance and other costs. Employing a close family member is only possible if the council has agreed it, so private PA work is a genuine route here.

Three hospital trusts serve the county. East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust runs Ipswich Hospital and community hospitals including Felixstowe and Aldeburgh, West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust runs West Suffolk Hospital in Bury St Edmunds, and James Paget University Hospitals at Gorleston serves Lowestoft. West Suffolk College offers Adult Care Worker and Lead Adult Care Worker apprenticeships, and East Coast College teaches Health and Social Care in Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth.

84% of the inspected care employers in Suffolk are rated Good or Outstanding by the CQC, close to the 82% across the East and in line with England as a whole (85%).