Despite us opening up 2 weeks ago to visits under controlled conditions, around half of our residents are still waiting for their families to even get in touch and arrange a visit. Letters, emails and phone calls sent to all family members describing the arrangements.
We can't force people to visit. No matter how much we can see how it's affecting their loved ones. The ones without capacity are actually fairing better because they don't understand that visiting is now allowed, and it's now up to the family. That's an incredibly hard pill to swallow. But then many care home residents are used to it in all honesty. "Ah they've got busy lives" is how they try and cope with it.
While a nice idea to think that families could take their loved one home and care for them, even temporarily, for a lot of people it's just not feasible or safe. If it were, why would the person be in a home to start with?
Last Christmas the residents who went home to a family member for dinner or the day was a grand total of zero. Around half had a half an hour visit. Ask yourself why before thinking that people can just be sent off to relatives during covid.
I have around 15 years experience in care, with hundreds of people, in that time there have been a handful of people who have had daily visits, the vast majority are weekly or longer.
It's hard to care for someone from my pov with complex physical needs, dementia, challenging behaviour, incontinence - and I get paid and get to go home, nor do I have the emotional attachment to the depth of them being my parent or aunt etc. I cannot imagine what that must be like, and I admire anyone who tries to do that, and certainly those who succeed, but it's not viable for so, so many people for so many reasons.
And as for the lady who took her mum from the care home, capable of 'expert' care because she was a retired nurse. She was arrested for pushing past a care worker and into the home - putting all the staff and residents at risk, not trying to see her mum. She had absolutely nothing in place to care for her mum outside the home, from what I could gather the only equipment she had was the wheelchair the lady was sitting in, not even medication. Hardly the actions of someone who was well placed to provide "expert" care. And if she was capable of doing so, why was she not already? Pre covid? Why was her mum in a care home in the first place?
As a humble care worker I think it's been a shit show quite honestly. It's showed up a lot of the problems that have been present for years, but have been highlighted now. Restrictions placed on care homes, without any effort to sort it out, PPE diverted, tests taking too long to come back, patients sent out without tests for care homes to cope with, exactly how do you stop a confused dementia sufferer wandering without some sort of restraint? Is that restraint justified because of covid?
So many questions that don't really have answers.