Over the last five decades, there has been an enormous increase in the numbers of private residential care homes. This has primarily been due to the closures of social service run 'homes' as well as a sharp reduction in the numbers of hospital beds in all areas of service.< >
To be fair , most of these 'private residential facilities' have delivered a good service of high standard and all in all these places have been broadly accepted as a suitable alternative to other forms of statutory care facilities eg hospitals - both acute and longer stay. It must be realised that there are hardly any 'longer term care' beds in our hospitals today and this not a bad thing. The persistent recommendations have been to keep long term sick individuals at their own homes for as long as possible supported within the community. <>
All that said , with the best will in the world and with the most intense support , not everyone could be maintained in their own homes ; a level of residential care would be needed. And as mentioned already , most of those private homes have done a good job . <>
Unfortunately we now know that not ALL the care homes AS WELL AS some hospitals are delivering optimal care especially to older people with dementia. The Care Quality Commission informs us that approximately 40 % of hospitals and private care homes are failing to meet with the nationally accepted standards of care for these individuals. Lack of proper facilities , lack of appropriately trained personnel and care staff , lack of privacy even lack of simple courtesy and personal behaviour are some of their 'findings' !!! It is unfortuante despite similar revelations many times in the past with fairly wide publicity, not enough has yet been done to 'rectify' these shortcomings completely. Whilst it is fully accepted that care staff in these areas do a very difficult job under a lot of pressure, negligence and improper behaviour and attitude can never be justified under any circumstances. The managers of these private facilities AS WELL AS those running our hospitals MUST remain accountable and , if fail persistently, should be removed from their positions. This is what happens in industry and in business/commerce sector ; why should such stern action not be taken in care sectors !!
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