Almost 10% of registered Isle of Wight care homes are rated ‘inadequate’ or ‘requires improvement’ by a national watchdog.
One institution in Sandown – Autumn House Residential Home – is currently marked inadequate and five others in Ryde, Bembridge and Ventnor require improvement, according to the Care Quality Commission (CQC).
Those requiring improvement include Ryde’s Highfield House Nursing Home and 22 Argyll Street, Inver House and The Elms Care Home in Bembridge and the Byrnhill Grove Registered Care Home in Ventnor.
The CQC publicly lists care homes it has inspected online, dividing them into archived and non-archived ones.
Archived services are no longer part of a provider’s registration with the CQC for reasons such as their closure or the service provider changing.
Empowering Islanders group leader Cllr Chris Jarman, who serves on County Hall’s adult social care, public health and housing needs committee, described the CQC’s findings as “very concerning”.
He said they reflect a “national systemic failure” of residential provision in the UK which is “teetering on the edge of collapse”.
Cllr Jarman told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS):
“A nation’s care for its elderly is often judged by how it supports their independence, dignity, and quality of life through a combination of strong social support, accessible healthcare, and inclusive community structures.
“With its particularly aged demographics, the Isle of Wight experiences one of the most acute pressures on both funding, places and staffing.
“We have been aware for several years that the Office for National Statistics forecast is for our population profile to continue skewing toward an increasingly aged population with many having multiple health conditions.
“It is essential, and long overdue, that provision is urgently made for new, much larger, care facilities at every level to ensure economies of scale and staffing.
“Our exceptional circumstances must be recognised by central government with substantial additional adult social care funding to support families and elderly in their own homes, supported care facilities such as Green Meadows in Colwell, and quality care and nursing homes for those in greatest need.”
The chair and vice-chair of the adult social care, public health and housing needs committee, councillors Clare Mosdell (independent) and Sarah Redrup (Liberal Democrat) said they are “actively working” with the providers of all six homes and “continue to monitor their progress”.
Their joint statement said:
“The Isle of Wight Council works closely with all providers to ensure the quality of service and provision is of good quality and meets the needs and expectations of those who use them and their families, with the vast majority of services rated good or outstanding.
“Where the provision of service is identified as not meeting that expectation through CQC inspection or our own quality assurance process, we require those providers to develop an improvement plan.
“We work closely with both the CQC and local providers to ensure delivery of the improvement plan and to monitor progress.
“Where the required improvements are not delivered, we consider formal action through our contract processes.”
By the headline of almost 10% also means OVER 90% meet the standard. Having had dealings with the CQC, I know for a fact they employed at least one inspector on the island who was not a healthcare professional. He was ambulance driver, a non registered health care assistant.
If ALL CQC inspections were un-announced then the 10% figure would probably be higher.
Totally unacceptable – there are no excuses.
Who would put their loved ones in such places!!
the mind boggles.
When faced with making the heart wrenching and impossible decision to place a loved one into a care facility here on the island, the difficulty of finding a decent well managed one was a daunting task. It seemed that no matter how carefully we researched and followed advice our choices were all terrible. Our loved one was failed at all of them despite our continuous input and absolute best efforts to help and support both them and the staff as they died neglected and with our concerns not listened to throughout their care journey. Two of these facilities are of apparently high standard but in our experience they fell miles short of the basic requirements one would expect especially when paying almost £1000 per month although the money was irrelevant in the end. It took years off our lives and haunts us still and will continue to for the rest of what’s left of it. It’s shameful how they get away with it. Ignorance and lack of care and empathy and the due attention to relatives who know their loved ones needs is dismissed and so the vicious cycle of neglect continues. Staffed by people with no experience or a caring bone often, not always, in them There were a rare few who were very helpful. They were exasperated by the state of affairs as well.
Much much more needs to be done to prevent unnecessary suffering and deaths in these places. I will be haunted forever and hope I never ever have to be admitted to any of them. Sadly the hospital failed them appalling too. The awful journey began with them when the basic care fell to the worst level we had seen actually
in a matter of weeks. There’s so much to be done but we can’t see it happening any time soon