Orchid View Care Home Review Makes Over 30 Recommendations to Prevent Future Abuse

The Serious Case Review into the abuse and neglect that contributed to the deaths of five elderly people at the Sussex care home, has made more than 30 recommendations to prevent a repeat of what the Department of Health called ‘truly appalling’ care.

Orchid View Care Home was run by Southern Cross and closed down in October 2011. At an inquest last year into the deaths of 19 former residents, a coroner described a culture of ‘institutionalised abuse’.

West Sussex coroner Penelope Schofield concluded five deaths at Orchid View were contributed to by neglect and in all 19 cases examined, the care residents were given, was described as ‘suboptimal’.

Nick Georgiou, former director for adult services of Hampshire County Council, was commissioned by West Sussex Adult Safeguarding Board to chair a Serious Case Review into the abuse and neglect at the care home.

The inquest into the case lasted five weeks and concluded 18 October 2013. It heard from witnesses who described scenes of patients being underfed and locked in their rooms, unsafe staffing levels, medical records being changed to cover up medication errors and call bells being left unanswered for long periods of time. The home was deemed “an accident waiting to happen”.

Peter Catchpole, West Sussex County Council’s Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Health, called the abuse and neglect at Orchid View “harrowing”.

Andrea Sutcliffe, the Care Quality Commission’s chief inspector of adult social care, admitted that the CQC “did not fulfil our purpose of making sure Orchid View provided services to people that were safe, compassionate and high quality. The way we worked when these serious incidents happened meant we did not respond to early warning signs, we were too easily reassured by the responses of Southern Cross and the people who worked there – and we did not take appropriate enforcement action quickly or strongly enough.”

Ms Sutcliffe added that action had been taken since the inquest to make the CQC more responsive to risks, and to improve inspections and that further improvements would be made.

The families of some of the residents who died have spoken out in the wake of the Serious Case Review findings expressing their frustration that there is still a lack of accountability for how severe the problems became before action was taken and calling for a more effective system for sharing information about care home standards and about the people who are working in and running them.

Laura Barlow, the solicitor representing the families of victims Jean Halfpenny, Jean Leatherbarrow, Doris Fielding, Enid Trodden, Bertram Jerome, Wilfred Gardner and John Holmes, said: “We still believe the horrific scale of neglect warrants a completely independent inquiry which would take into account this Review as well as pulling together all the organisations involved in safeguarding care to provide a true blueprint for change in reforming the whole care industry – this must be the lasting legacy of the Orchid View scandal.”

For more details please visit: http://www.carehome.co.uk/news/article.cfm/id/1563867/orchid-view-care-home-review-recommendations, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-27761939 or to read the full report go to: www.westsussex.gov.uk/your_council/news_and_events/news/2014_archive/june_2014/orchid_view_serious_case_revie.aspx

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