On Wednesday the CQC published a review on how the health care needs of people living in care homes are met.
The review addresses how service users access healthcare services, the level of choice and control that they have and whether the care they receive is safe and respects their dignity. The idea was to develop a view on the kinds of problems encountered in this area. The findings have illustrated the issues care homes may be struggling with.
CQC inspectors visited a small sample of 81 care homes from within 9 PCT areas to compile the results published.
The findings included:
- 77% of homes inspected took the view of their service users into account.
- 96% of homes, through use of informal or responsive monitoring, identified the changing healthcare needs of residents.
- 25% of residents claimed that they did not feel they were offered a choice of male or female staff to help them use the toilet.
- 38% of homes reported they got routine visits from GPs.
- 10% of care homes said they paid GPs to visit residents.
Commenting on the findings, Amanda Sherlock from the CQC stated “Despite having a disproportionately high level of dependence on health services, this group appear to be more disadvantaged than the rest of the population in accessing these services.”
The CQC intend to incorporate these issues into their upcoming inspection programme that focusses on dignity and nutrition in 500 care homes.
