Uncle with dementia in care but being neglected

In mums nursing home there was a small incident with her the other week - nothing major (no burns or anything). The Home referred themselves to safeguarding, to make sure it was properly investigated and reported.

That’s what a decent Home does

@Ibloodylovetea Im sorry to hear this update. Obviously you can’t give someone cold tea to drink. It may be he was being helped to drink and knocked the tea/whatever over himself. Or he picked up someone else’s tea and wasn’t being close enough supervised.

Reporting to Adult SS/CQC will at best result in the home having to apply special measures. This usually means yet more paperwork which takes staff even more time away from providing care. If every substandard home/ward was closed, there’d simply be nowhere to put everyone.

You've already mentioned his needs were so great that other homes refused him and it is probably getting to the point where this one may give him notice to leave too.

I really do hate to be so depressing but unless you’ve worked in a number of these homes/wards, you cannot comprehend how utterly utterly desperate the situation is. Even the ones with “excellent” ratings I worked in were a bit shit. It’s just different levels of shittyness.

Im so sorry 💐

They need reporting to the Safeguarding Team at the council.

Crazy what if there wasn't anyone at all?
They should be keeping him safe.
Dosent make sense the care home is so far away?

They could be short staffed aren't most care homes?
Getting other people's clothes, I've heard that before to be honest?

I'm sorry but I have not read all of the replies.

In my opinion, their sons need to move their parents to care homes nearer to them so they can be more hands on. The situations they are in is not acceptable and although you are obviously a loving and caring niece, it should be their sons (our cousins ) who are responsible.
You have made it easy for your cousins=to renege on their duties

To get power of attorney the uncle would have had to agree to this before he had dementia
Op I can understand why you're concerned unfortunately many care homes are poorly staffed ,and these kind of incidents can be common and no its not good enough
I was a nurse on a dementia ward and the clothes thing happened there too
The CQC can do unarrarraged visits .

@Pippa246

"As a sub-note - former racing driver Sir Jackie Stewart was on TV months back demanding better care for people with dementia- more needs to be done, better standards, better trained carers etc - whilst admitting he had a team of 8 full time nurses providing 24 hour care for his wife.
Advancements in treatment for cancer, cardiovascular disease and diabetes mean many people are living longer than they otherwise would have and many of them will develop dementia. It’s an issue no one really wants to tackle as it’s simply too costly."

Yes, coming here to second the above.

When my FIL had dementia, I helped look after him at home alongside my MIL. Eventually his needs got sky high and we had to employ a carer to come during the weekdays. Even then, the house smelled of shit and piss from time to time. We'd clean up as soon as it happened, but it was UTTERLY RELENTLESS and it went on long enough to nearly break us.

The UK badly needs to sort out social care but we all need to be aware of the sheer amount of work it takes to care for someone with dementia, both emotional and physical. After seeing my FIL's life continually extended by the use of antibiotics (for a chest infection and then for multiple water infections) I think we need to take a good hard look as to whether someone with advanced dementia can consent to life-extending treatment/heroics or whether there should be an automatic opt-out.

OP you are very kind to visit your uncle and help your aunt too. I suspect the "butt out" implication is because your relatives feel guilty about how much help they can feasibly provide while balancing lives of their own. Maybe they are experiencing carer burnout or need to prioritise other things and are reacting defensively. Even looking after my FIL at home there were people who told us we ought to be doing this/that/the other and had we looked at a care home? My MIL in particular found these comments hard to deal with because she took them quite personally.

Mum is in a Care Home, she’s in the EMI unit, due to her high needs (which is mostly dementia patients). She has also had a massive stroke so mostly immobile.

It does smell of Wee, I think that’s pretty parr for the course.

The staff are lovely, my mum is a nightmare, and they are great. Show real affection, and care.

She wears her own clothes, the woman who does the laundry is fastidious in this!

Food is a bit bland, it’s all cooked on site, and is perfectly ok, but we take in treats.

She’s well looked after, clean and fed, and safe. It’s not The Ritz, it’s a nursing home.

Your relatives should be getting better care

@Ibloodylovetea

Yes, it would all be left to her! I am actually furious on your behalf, OP. They should be falling over themselves to thank you.

Please look after yourself too. You are very kind but they are not your parents. My mum did all the legwork for my gran - who recently died with dementia in a care home - while her feckless brothers did nothing.

My gran recently died in a care home. They were pretty good though. On visiting the care home initially, to assess its suitability, the manager advised my mum 'if you visit a care home and smell urine, walk straight back out'.

It's a bit bloody rich that they're telling you to butt out. Are they going to miraculously step up then?

And what a shocker that it's men, leaving all the work to the woman of the family ... and a woman who's not even the child of this vulnerable couple!

Not all nursing homes are bad. My friend's Nan with dementia is in a Colton care home and is really happy & treated well.
But I've known a carer who worked at a different Colton care home and she said the management were awful.

So homes vary even within companies!

Sometimes the best homes are the cheap and cheerful ones too.

It doesn't sound great. My dad has advanced dementia and is in a nursing home. It's clean, doesn't smell and the staff are brilliant. They really look after him. He's not had a major fall there yet, but he had them frequently when he was living at home.

I’m afraid this is all completely normal for “care” homes and will likely only get worse. The standards of care are appalling but the reality is also that you just cannot provide the level of care some people with dementia require without having at least one carer for every two residents which will never happen.

Add in that people who get rejected from night fill at Tesco will breeze into a position of “carer”, get maybe two days face to face training with the rest online modules for which the assessments are ridiculously easy. The homes just don’t care.

NHS long term dementia wards are even worse as they take the patients the care homes won’t - those who scream continuously, headbang the walls, eat their own faeces. I’ve worked in both private and NHS older adult care and it is really grim.

It’s one of the reasons I’m really pro assisted dying. Even though people with dementia are largely excluded from existing assisted dying programs (such as those in Australia), I believe there is scope to have them included.

As a sub-note - former racing driver Sir Jackie Stewart was on TV months back demanding better care for people with dementia- more needs to be done, better standards, better trained carers etc - whilst admitting he had a team of 8 full time nurses providing 24 hour care for his wife.

Advancements in treatment for cancer, cardiovascular disease and diabetes mean many people are living longer than they otherwise would have and many of them will develop dementia. It’s an issue no one really wants to tackle as it’s simply too costly.