Issued 19th July 2001

?10 A DAY PROPOSAL FOR 'FREE NURSING CARE'
LIKE A SLAP WITH A COLD FLANNEL

So-called 'free nursing care' for the elderly in nursing homes - a Government pledge in the general election - looks likely to be priced at an unrealistically low level, according to the Registered Nursing Home Association. Just ?10 a day is the figure being proposed to cover the cost of all the nursing care provided to a nursing home patient.

Responding to Government proposals published Tuesday (17th July), the RNHA plans to challenge the basis on which the nursing component of care has been costed.

RNHA chief executive officer Frank Ursell said the proposed figures seemed like a slap with a cold flannel after all the pre-election 'hype' about the Government's commitment to free nursing care for older people and others with special needs.

He said: "It's all very well for politicians to posture for effect, but the figures released yesterday suggest that the Government wants something on the cheap. It claims to want high standards of care to be delivered, but the proposed ?10 a day standard NHS contribution to a patient's nursing home costs sends the very opposite signal."

Suggested Government figures presume that a standard level of nursing care can be provided adequately for ?10 per patient per day. This figure, the Government claims, would pay for all the care provided each day to a patient by a registered nurse, as well as the time spent by the nurse in supervising care provided by other staff.

For patients with particularly complex needs, the Government has calculated the cost at just over ?15 a day. For those with 'minimal' needs, the figure would be no more than about ?5 a day.

Added Mr Ursell: "The Government has made great play of the fact that it is putting enormous additional resources into health care. If that is the case, the 200,000 elderly people in Britain's nursing homes would appear to be the forgotten ones."

The RNHA has also expressed serious doubts about the proposal that the process of assessing whether or not individuals qualify for free nursing care should be overseen by the same organisations which hold the budgets.

Under the proposals, nurses working for health authorities and primary care trusts would make the assessments and decide whether people are eligible. This, the association argues, runs the risk of ending up as a system dominated by the accountant's bottom line rather than the needs of highly dependent and vulnerable patients.

"Most people will know what happened when community care was introduced with a great fanfare in the early 1990s," said Mr Ursell. "Assessments of need were often not worth the paper they were written on. Rigid budgetary limits were set and even if individuals were found to be in need of basic care, they often had to go without. History could repeat itself again with free nursing care on the NHS. Nurses will make the assessments of needs but administrators will ultimately decide what can and cannot be paid for."

The RNHA will be studying the Government's proposals carefully over the coming weeks and intends to submit alternative costings which, it says, will reflect the true cost of nursing patients up to acceptable standards."

END

For further information please contact Frank Ursell, Chief Executive Officer, RNHA (Tel: 07785 227000 mobile or 0121-454 2511 office)

Note to editors:

The Government's proposed figures for the NHS contribution to cover the cost of nursing care provided in nursing homes are contained in draft guidance published on 17th July 2001 by the Department of Health. Full details of the draft guidance can be found on the DoH website at: www.doh.gov.uk/jointunit/freenursingcare