The Committee will receive a presentation from the Head of Adult Social Care.
Minutes:
The Committee received a presentation on Dignity in Care from the Quality and Safeguarding Service Manager. The Committee were reminded that dignity was not a new word or concept in care and health services and that the principle of dignity was how individuals in care are respected.
The Committee was informed of the eight main factors which promoted dignity in care. These were:
The Committee were advised of how dignity was delivered and the challenges that can be faced in achieving this. Some of the factors that impacted on this were cross cultural, interpersonal and communication issues. Recruitment was also a problem and Job Centre data indicated that the largest numbers of vacancies were in the care sector. Nationally it was difficult to recruit care staff. Given the low status and pay of such work the consequence was that there was often reliance within the care sector on recruiting overseas. This could, on occasions, contribute to communication difficulties between service users and workers.
The manager for the Havering Reablement Service, gave an example of the application of principles of dignity in relation to a service user of the Reablement Service. A 68 year old retired health care professional, who had broken her wrist and then as a result of a fall had then broken her arm and dislocated her other shoulder. She had discharged herself from the hospital and had the support of a friend, but needed assistance in dressing and doing everyday tasks. The comments she fed back after the reablement at home service included the staff being very friendly, that they had introduced themselves, they explained what they were doing, and ensured that she retained her privacy/dignity when using the bathroom. They also assisted in pain management effectively. After a period of reablement the service user recovered enough to be able to use one arm and regained her independence.
The Committee asked if there were any staffing issues in relation to training or qualifications of paid carers. Officers explained that trained and qualified staff could be recruited. As there was however no specific reablement qualification much of the training was carried out in-house.
A member asked what happened if things went wrong, and if there was a “Whistle Blowing” policy. The officer explained that that all service providers were required to ensure that there were policies in place and that they were expected to support staff to feel able to speak out. If concerns were raised with the Council they were always taken seriously. The Adults Safeguarding Team screened all safeguarding concerns that were raised. Where appropriate full investigations were carried out to ascertain if there was a safeguarding issue. If it was not a safeguarding issue the query was passed (if appropriate) to another team for the matter to be looked into. If the concerns were about care quality and other issues to do with operation of care services, the Quality Assurance Team followed the query up. Where there were major and/ or frequent serious concerns which involved a particular Service Provider an embargo restricting new admissions/ placements could be put on the provider until the issue was resolved.
Members asked about the issue of “double-jobbing”, whereby staff work in one care service during the day and then in care homes during the night, where they might try to catch up on sleep. Officers stated that having two part time jobs was not necessarily an issue, but working a full time day job and then a night job could cause problems. These situations needed to be dealt with on an individual basis. It was added that currently some people find it necessary for economic reasons to have more than one job.
Adult Social Care worked closely with care homes in a cooperative way in order to get the right balance. The Committee were informed that all care homes had detailed care plans for service users and that annual reviews were carried out by Social Workers who gave feedback on areas of care requiring future action.
A member raised an issue of the local Safer Neighbourhood Teams (SNT) trying to access information about vulnerable people in the area. This was so they could liaise with them, and give advice to keep them safe in their own homes. The SNT found that due to Data Protection Legislation, information could not be provided. Officers indicated that there were issues of client confidentiality which needed to be taken into account when disclosing information. It was felt however that this should not necessarily be an insurmountable problem in the context of Data Protection.
The Committee thanked the officers for the informative presentation.