Enter and view: The Hamlet Care Home

Healthwatch Salford carried out an Enter and View visit to the Hamlet Care Home, a residential care home with places for up to 9 residents.

The home was evaluated against eight quality indicators: strong, visible management; staff with the time and skills to do their jobs; good knowledge of each individual resident and how their needs may be changing; a varied programme of activities; quality, choice and flexibility around food and mealtimes; ensuring residents can regularly see health professionals such as GPs, dentists, opticians or chiropodists; accommodating residents’ personal, cultural and lifestyle needs; and being an open environment where feedback is actively sought and used. 

findings

Authorised representatives conducted interviews with three members of staff at the care home, including the Deputy Manager. Topics such as quality of care, safety, dignity, respecting and acknowledging the resident’s and families’ wishes and staff training were explored. Authorised representatives also approached two residents at the care home to ask them about their experiences of the home and, where appropriate, other topics such as accessing health care services. One family member was also spoken to as they were with a resident at the time.

A proportion of the visit was also observational, involving the authorised representatives walking around the public/communal areas and observing the surroundings to gain an understanding of how the home works and how the residents engaged with staff members and the facilities. There was an observation checklist prepared for this purpose. Due to the accessible information needs and disabilities of many of the residentials an Easy Read version of the resident’s survey was created, and Talking Mats were also used to communicate with residents as appropriate.

Residents expressed a sense of being comfortable and happy in the home, were able and supported to have choices in food, activities and their care. They enjoyed one-to-ones with both staff and other residents. Staff expressed a high level of pride in their work and said that they were supported well by management with regular supervisions and training to carry out their role and care for residents.

It was clear from speaking to residents and staff that many activities were available and offered and residents could join in with activities at the day centre and staff respected residents right to refuse but there was some concern from a family member about one resident’s weight gain and how staff might better support their family member to get active again. This, in part, could be put down to lifestyle choice and staff respecting the resident’s right to autonomy and choice.

Other needs were catered for and accommodated, with staff supporting residents to access health care services and making changes to the menu to suit one resident’s requirement for Halal food.

Recommendations

• the home should provide more support to residents who require more prompting to be active and maintain a healthy weight.
• The home should get support for activities through existing initiatives through places like Salford Leisure or Salford CVS.
• The home should work with other charities for disabled people in the Salford area to encourage residents to participate in appropriate community-based activities and exercise.
• The home should make more use of photos and images within the home and other accessible methods such as printing on pastel coloured paper
• The home should provide a photo board of all staff, including their names, showing clearly who the managers are.

The care provider responded positively to the report.