TO POINT OUT...PANORAMA (TUES) Worse ever secret filming of abuse of vulnerable people.

[ScousyFogarty]

This was the most tragic ever "secret filming" by Panorama of abuse on vulnerable patients in care home. (arrests now made of some staff)

Did any of you manage to sit through the programme? It was an ordeal just to watch

my sister has low tollerance hates the elderly and children doesnt like cleaning up vomit or poo she screams if her hands get dirty ,,,you know the type where did she get a job...our elderly folks home as a carer shes totally weird person too just a generally moody horrible unfriendly and a snob wtf she got a job with the elderly for is beyound me id hate to think what shes like with them but she needed a job after redundancy

gramercy- you have quoted the ideal but not everyone who works in MH has those qualities, either. In areas that have recruitment problems (they don't exsist in the area that i live in) then it must be the level of wages.

smileandwave-she must be different at work and 'getting her hands dirty' because there is no way that she would be 'carried' in care work.

Care work is seen as menial and low status.

Care workers seem to be made up of the dedicated who do their job because they want to do their very best and those who do it because they cannot get a job anywhere else.

So you have an army of low paid, good people who stay late on shift, go out of their way and over their pay grade to help their residents.

You get those who have no wish to work in the care sector and resent everything they do. They are slapdash at best and abusive at worse.

Care work needs to be treated as a proper job, worthy of respect. It shouldnt be over professionalised - i.e. everyone has to have a degree - this can exclude excellent workers. It should be valued.

We should stop shoving no - hopers into the job simply because no one else will have them.

Its the age old problem. Care work has historically been seen as women's work. Therefore it is undervalued.

thefristMrsD I had a collegue who worked with me at the day center from Denmark and she said that to do what we were doing (community access workers) we would need a degree and the pay was good too. They were viewed as a profession over there, here not not so, it is seen as the last resort if you can't find a job.

That is interesting piglet. I feel quite strongly that we should not insist on degrees though. That is happening in Early Years now. I think its important that workers are well trained, monitored and regularly update their training but think that insisting on academic qualifications is too exclusive.

There is an army of middle aged, working class women out their with basic educational standards who are the backbone of care work.

The trouble is care homes are crying out for staff.There are pages and pages of vacancies so i guess it is difficult to be too slective about who they take.
This kind of work is difficult and the staff need training in correct methods of dealing with people with learning difficulties.That journalist was given zero training by teh company (although the production company gave him some)Also there seemed nothing for them to do all day, and the staff and clients were bored That said, nothing can excuse the treatment meted out to those poor people especially Simone

It is not seen by everyone as a last resort if you cannot find a job, that is so insulting to the army of dedicated care workers that we have. Blame those in senior postions for giving the jobs to bad workers and then not supervising them enough, to get rid of them.

I do agree thefirstMrs that is what my told me was happening in Denmark at the time. In the day centre I worked at staff would have to do NVQ qualifications. There should be a basic educational standard though, and undergo extensive training across the private and public sector in care.

I don't think I'll be able to bring myself to watch it after reading all of these comments. The vulnerable should be protected and the perpetrators should go to prison. A message needs to go out that this will never again be tolerated. The Chief Executive needs to resign with immediate effect.

Do care workers need to register with the Health Professions Council... That might be a way to filter out the bad ones and take action where necessary?

There were 'qualified' nurses witnessing abuse and letting it carry on. There should be a good mix of people working and no one should be working alone so that the abuse can take place. It depends on the basic educational standard set, realistically on a night shift it is all abiout changing pads and turning people, it should be done under the direction of a dedicated nurse, that is all that is needed.

did you read all of my post bird or just the bit you wanted to get annoyed at?

I agree Birds I was one of those dedicated workers before I gave up to be a STAHM. I know a few people who could not find a job, and took care work as a last resort, no not all but a lot do, and the evidence was to be seen last night in Panorama

Chipotle- care workers ideally should be CRB and POVA checked, but it isn't insisted on. Strong management is needed to get rid of bad care workers. Unfortunately managers are often chosen to maximise profits not the quality of life for the residents.

piglet- i think it is more of a case of abusive people finding a way to carry out that abuse rather than them taking the job as a last resort. I know people in rural areas who end up working with animals that would rather not but would not dream of treating them cruelly. Those on the program and abusive or neglectful carers that i have worked with are not acting out of job disatisfaction.

I do agree birds its a way of them getting control, no none of my friends who took jobs in care would ever do such a thing, they are lovely people. I have met a lot of lovely dedicated people whilst working in care, that is why I was and and when I saw Panorama last night, I have never witnessed anything at all like this in my time in care.

someone at worse might be a bit slap dash, or try to to things the easy way but not like this, to this extent.

There was a woman in the Panorama programme who loved fairies and dolls, and the way she was treated was . It reminded me of a service user I used to work with,in her 50's who loved dolls, fairies, and Barbie you name it.

In every other job the manager (or nurse in charge, in this case) is responsible for the conduct of their staff and i feel that this does not happen within care homes, enough. I have had both permanant postions and worked on agency, there is a culture within care homes that needs to end.

In one of the care homes that i worked in, the manager bended the rules to allow younger people (50 yr olds) with LD's to be placed there. This was worked out with the SW because they both knew of the conditions in the place that they should have gone.

sorry but there are so many misconceptions on this thread.

you do not have to have 'physical strength' to work with people with MH problems

CQC requires all staff working in registered care homes who have access to service users to undertake an enhanced CRB check. Until it comes through they should not have unsupervised access to the residents. To do otherwise is a breach of essential standards

Local authority run homes also have serious safeguarding issues as do homes run by charities....it is not limited to profit making organisations. Council run homes are closing because they are expensive to run and it is cheaper to place people in a home run by another organisation.

If a Council places and individual in a care home it has ongoing responsibility to ensure that the placement is adequare both through individual reviews and its contract monitoring process

The PCT (NHS) can also make the placement if the person is entitled to funding from the NHS (called continuuing healthcare). if this is the case the NHS is responsible for ensuring the care is appropropriate - even if they have placed the patient in a private facility/ home.

The CQC does and has closed homes down but this is relatively rare. This is because of the shortage of placements - particularly if the facility is specialist. With elderly people it is only advisable to move them if absolutely necessary. The approach taken is usually to work with the home to bring the home up to acceptable levels of care and sometimes the home will bring in an entirely new staff team or perhapa a manager to sort the problems out.

I didn't watch the programme but i have seen it for myself. My DD is a supervisor of a mental health unit and the 'clear out' of staff that they are having thanks to a new dedicated area manager has been along time coming.

Kidderminster - i could start you a list of care homes that i know where the staff are not CRB checked. It isn't misconceptions it is what is happening. I reported a home and the staff are still there, so there has been nothing done, you are quoting the ideal.

it is not the ideal - it is the standards that care homes have to adherre to. Otherwise it is a breach of regs and could jeopardise the regsitration.

If you know of homes that do not do this then you need to report to CQC asap.

Of course CRB checks only check if someone has been convicted of an offence.

When i posted about people placed under 'residential' instead of 'nursing' that is what i have seen and know is still happening. The monitoring isn't happening in reality. Staff are not listened to when they complain about a service user who cannot weightbear, is doubley incontinent, confused, unable to feed themselves etc but is under 'residential', so needs two person care.