EDITORIAL MARCH 2011

BY EILEEN CHUBB

( THIS ARTICLE IS THE COPYRIGHT OF EILEEN CHUBB 2011)

This month the five largest care companies go to downing street to ask for their homes to be filled by NHS patients. This charity is absolutely opposed to this for the following reasons,

These companies have for years made huge profits much of it from the tax payer, what care has this public money bought for the countless vulnerable people who have suffered abuse and neglect in homes owned by these companies?

To place the sick and vulnerable from hospitals into the hands of the care industry would be perverse when you consider the numbers of people who have needed hospital treatment because of being neglected in these same care homes.

At a time of spending cuts it has never been so important to spend the little there is wisely and bailing out a care industry who have failed miserably is not the way. This Government has a rare chance to take back control of care of the elderly but that would take courage as well as common sense.

The Government should remember the public outrage at the bailout of banking industry as it would be nothing compared to a bailout of the care industry because their profits have been acquired from appalling suffering for the want of care.

This editorial is being copied to Downing Street so the voice of the Care industry is not the only one that is heard.

Eileen Chubb

Tales Of The Un-Inspected

Home Number 90

By Eileen Chubb

( This Report is the Copyright of Eileen Chubb 2011)

This home is owned by the same company as homes, 33, 36, 41, 48, 49, 50, 54, 59, 60, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 70, 71, 72, 82, 84, 87, 88, 89. Please see our Archive section for all reports.

The care regulator, CQC list home 90 as not yet rated, its past history has therefore been erased and there are no inspection reports available at all. However I managed to obtain one report on this home from another source.

When a home has a registration date of June 2010, the public are led to believe this is when the home was first registered under the current owners, this home has been owned by the same company from at least 2005.

When a homes history is wiped information such as that listed below is withheld from the public,

The inspection report dated December 2005, gives me the following information,

There are 38 care standards, the inspectors only judged 7 off those and of those 7 the home failed to meet 5. This is as bad as it gets.

Medication was not checked but there is reference made to a history of medication problems.

Relatives and residents feel their concerns are not taken seriously which explains why people are desperate enough to take concerns to the regulator directly and it is noted that a large number of concerns have been received by the regulator. These concerns related to low staffing levels, standards of care, management and incidents of theft.

It is stated that inspectors looked at staff Rotas to make a judgement that there are sufficient staffing levels but further on in the report it states that the staff Rotas need to reflect the actual numbers of staff working. When people have raised concerns about there not being enough staff and inspectors investigate, I would have expected common sense to prevail.

The home is noted to have very frail and dependent residents with dementia but the home is not registered to care for residents with Dementia so is in breech of its registration. The staffing levels would be set higher for Dementia care, what I see is a situation where abuse and neglect will continue. However that information is not accessible to the public nor is any of the above available.

Eileen Chubb

Tales Of The Un-Inspected

Home Number 89

By Eileen Chubb

( Copyright of Eileen Chubb 2011 )

This Home is owned by the same company as homes, 33, 36, 41, 48, 49, 50, 54, 59, 60, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 70, 71, 72, 82, 84, 87, 88. Please see archive section for all reports. I would ask that anyone using information from this site has the decency to credit the charity.

I attempted to look at the inspection history of this home and found that it had been erased by the regulator, the CQC list this home as a not yet rated service and as such there are no past inspection reports available at all.

However as a result of considerable time and effort I did manage to obtain one inspection report from a source other then CQC.

That report rates the home as Zero Star Poor and lists a catalogue of failures including,

Lack of staff to meet residents needs,

Failure to provide any activities or human contact,

Failure to report abuse to the proper Authorities,

Staff not having access to care plans,

Distressed residents calling out and ignored,

Staff becoming angry with residents in front of inspectors so will be much worse when no one is watching.

Residents waiting over an hour for food at mealtimes and being physically restrained.

Staff observed telling residents, You will just have to wait.Unreported complaints and safeguarding issues includeing neglect residents assaults and allegations against staff.

The home is so dirty that residents and staff are judged to be at risk of cross infection.

This home has a history of problems as all previous requirements have been deleted as the report states the inspection is treating this home as a new service from the date it re-registered with the CQC, yet this home has been open and under the same owners for at least 3 years.

The public have this information withheld from them by the very regulator who claims their role is,

Providing accessible, trustworthy information on the quality of care so people can make better decisions about their care,

In reality the CQC protect the care home not those in need of care to live.

Eileen Chubb

Tales Of The Un-Inspected

Home Number 88

By Eileen Chubb

( Copyright of Eileen Chubb 2011)

This home is owned by the same company as homes, 33, 36, 41, 48, 49, 50, 54, 59, 60, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 70, 71, 72, 82, 84, 87. Please see archive section for all reports.

I looked for the inspection history of this home and found that it had been erased by the regulator, the CQC list this home as a not yet rated service and therefore the public are denied the information about this homes past history.

I found this home was registered in 2007 so has been run by the company that currently owns it for at least four years. Yet the only information I could obtain about its past was a news report two years ago about the home having no hot water for a month.

When I looked at the current status of this home I found that it has been given a good rating, which CQC say is the result of an inspection, however even that inspection report is not available to the public.

I am finding I need to use the freedom of information act more and more in order to obtain inspection reports which are supposed to be freely available public documents, that says much about the regulation of the care industry.

Eileen Chubb