This article is from page 2 of the 2008-08-12 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 2 JPG
THE Health Service Executive has given a clean bill of health to a Crat- loe-based nursing home – but only after an earlier inspection produced a critical report on aspects of its op- eration earlier this year.
After an unannounced inspection in March, the HSE found that best practice was not being implemented in a number of areas in the operation of the 40 bed Sancta Maria nursing home at Cratloe.
The report found that the deficien- cies appeared to be due to insuffi- cient staff numbers, but also reflect- ed inadequate supervision of work
practices.
However the HSE report concluded that the inspection team considered that the nursing home had a good standard of management.
The report found that on the day of inspection, several beds were made up with stained, crumpled and untidy linen and recommended that those beds to be remade using fresh linen.
“Accommodation in some _ bed- rooms was quite congested, making cleaning, nursing duties and circula- tion in those rooms somewhat diffi- cult. A redistribution of beds within the home is recommended.”
The report suggested that “a suffi- cient number of competent staff are
on duty at all times having regard to the number of persons maintained and the extent of their dependency”’.
This followed the inspectors dis- covering that care attendants do the laundry in the nursing home.
‘This is inappropriate, as it reduces their availability to residents: their role should be solely in providing di- rect patient care. Many areas within the nursing home, particularly in the older part of the building and the kitchen, were poorly and inadequate- ly cleaned.”
The HSE recorded that the previ- ous inspection in August of last year found the nursing home to be “sub- stantially compliant with current
nursing home inspectorate regula- tions at the time of inspection”.
A spokesman for the nursing home said that the building was undergo- Thovcmmaet-y(O) Mm Kos AUDMOyEJevON(oUO MEI ME ROCoMmBD Dele of the HSE inspection earlier this year and has since had two inspec- tions where the HSE found it to be fully in compliance.
He said that all the requirements from the first HSE report this year had been complied with.
‘Before the March inspection, we never had a breach. This is a family run home and we maintain the high- est of standards. We get a lot of re- peat business and if families weren’t happy, they wouldn’t return.”