NEWS RELEASE FROM THE
REGISTERED NURSING HOME ASSOCIATION
Issued 25th October 2005
REVIEW OF CARE HOME REGULATION
‘A DAMP SQUIB’, SAYS RNHA
OPPORTUNITY MISSED TO FOCUS ON HEALTH OUTCOMES
FOR PATIENTS RATHER THAN ADMINISTRATION
AND BUREAUCRACY
Something of a damp squib is how the Registered Nursing Home Association (RNHA) describes the Department of Health’s consultation document on proposed changes to regulations governing adult social care services, including care homes.
According to the RNHA, the government’s proposals fail completely to address the key issue of national minimum care standards, which most nursing home operators believe are too narrowly focused on administrative processes at the expense of health outcomes for patients.
The association claims that when just over a year ago the then minister for the community, Dr Stephen Ladyman, announced a review of the regulations and standards, it was widely assumed from the words used that it would be a root and branch analysis of what needed to be changed and that some of the more ‘bizarre’ standards would be ditched.
Commented RNHA chief executive officer Frank Ursell: “There is a lot of disappointment among the providers of care to older people that the government has just tinkered around the edges of regulation by confining the current consultation more or less to the frequency of inspections.”
He added : “Our expectation had been that the government would come up with clear proposals for modifying the existing minimum care standards so that they concentrate more on the delivery of health care rather than on paperwork and business matters. We believe this would have been beneficial to patients.
“From all that we had heard from the Commission for Social Care Inspection, we believed that at long last we would be seeing genuine movement from a set of standards about processes to a set which are about outcomes. Unfortunately, it appears that there is going to be a long delay before the Department of Health gets round to this crucially important task. It is disappointing to say the least.”
In the past, the RNHA has consistently highlighted the problem that only around one fifth of the 246 individual care standards relate to the actual nursing and health care provided to nursing home patients.
END
Notes to editors:
1. In October 2005, the Department of Health published a consultation document entitled Proposed Changes to the Regulatory Framework for Adult Social Care Services.
2. There has been expectations that the above document would address concerns about the national minimum care standards introduced in June 2003 in accordance with section 23 of the Care Standards Act 2000. However, the document does not contain proposals about changes to the standards.
3. The Registered Nursing Home Association represents over 1,300 nursing home providers throughout the UK.
For further information, please contact Frank Ursell, Chief Executive Officer, Registered Nursing Home Association (Tel: 0121-454 4511 or mobile 07785 227000.
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