Enter and view: Ashglade Care Home, Bickley

Healthwatch Bromley visited Ashglade Care Home on Tuesday 3rd March 2015. The aim of the visit was to engage with residents of the home to understand their experience and give service users the chance to voice their opinions regarding the care they receive. As a result of Healthwatch Bromley’s community engagement, there have been several comments submitted to the signposting log regarding care for the elderly in the borough. Healthwatch Bromley’s visit to Ashglade Care Home was in response to this.

The home was informed of our visit a month in advance and initial questions were answered by the manager via email correspondence, to the best of their ability. Three trained Healthwatch Bromley Authorised Enter & View Representatives (ARs) participated in this piece of work and they observed roughly 12 residents and talked to several about their experiences of the home.

Healthwatch Bromley categorised their findings in the following way: Premises; staff; food; activities and additional findings. The representatives found that Ashglade was a very small care home (12 rooms) offering a personal and homely environment. Tight budgeting by the owner would seemed to be influencing staffing levels which were adequate but seemed to rely too heavily on the manager stepping in as and when required. Nonetheless, the home appeared to be operating to a satisfactory standard, with kind and caring staff in place. The residents the HWB ARs spoke to seemed both happy and content.

Healthwatch Bromley made the following recommendations:

- In places such as the kitchen the care home was tired looking and some refurbishment might benefit residents and staff.

- Where possible, it was suggested the manager adopted a more supervisory role, as the daily running of home tended to eclipse other managerial duties.