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A CARER SUBJECTED a number of elderly care patients to extreme abuse – calling one a “big, fat c**t” and throwing water over another, according to recently released documents.
In a complaint to the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa), a former worker in an unidentified care home said that a fellow worker had abused some residents.
In the first incident, the complainant said that they had witnessed an elderly patient who was on their deathbed being abused by the member of staff.
The resident had to be turned because they had pressure sores and the staff member said “roll over there you big fat c**t”. This was reported to a senior staff member but no action was taken.
A week later, the complainant said that they saw the same staff member throw water over en elderly resident suffering from dementia to stop them talking. They reported the incident to a more senior carer but again no substantive action was taken.
The complainant said that they had no choice but to resign following the lack of action from senior staff.
Complaints
The details of the complaint are contained in documents released by Hiqa under freedom of information legislation to Louth TD Fergus O’Dowd.
O’Dowd has been an active campaigner for improving standards in care homes for the past number of years.
The documents detail complaints received by Hiqa from the areas of childcare services, elderly care services and disability services between 1 June and 31 October 2015.
The individual cases are either partially or fully redacted in most instances in order to fully protect the identities of those involved as well as the locations of the events.
The documents contain over 200 individual complaints made about services, care homes, staff and management among others.
Complaints of alleged abuse from staff or other patients, inadequate services or monitoring and improper oversight list highly among concerns raised.
Some of the more notable complaints include:
Investigation
In a statement, Hiqa said that it did not have a remit to investigate individual complaints received by it.
Under the Health Act 2007, however, Hiqa said that it can inspect and evaluate services against national standards. Where appropriate, it can use its statutory powers which can include enforcement and prosecution.
The authority said that any complaints which potentially indicated a risk to the quality and safety of the services it regulated provided it with valuable information to its regulatory activities.
The authority said that did not comment on individual cases but that in 2015 were 56 single issue and triggered inspections of designated centres for elderly people.
It also said that wherever a crime had been committed, the information would be passed onto the gardaí.
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“A CARER”?????? An insult to the wonderful carers both family and professional who care for our people.
This is frightening, truly frightening. What it indicates is that our care homes, and I use the term lightly, are places where our elderly and disabled receive ‘pot luck’ care depending on where they happen to be and who happens to be caring for them. If they are abused, and there is a possibility of this happening, any complaints made will see no action taken – unless of course the media happens to be involved. All of this gives the impression that when choosing a care home for a loved one the choice boils down to which one will do the least harm, and for that it costs a small fortune.
I’ve also heard rumours that some hospitals are turning a blind eye to staff reporting other staff carrying out procedures for which they’re not qualified, like inserting needles into patients arms, as they’re so short staffed and fear if this is stopped or audited they’ll have to hire extra staff. The other side of the argument of course is litigation should any mistakes occur.
This is your future unless something is done about it now.
A scarer more like.
If the complaints are upheld then the perpetrator should be named and shamed.
These criminals should be jailed as an example to others
We need to radically change our attitudes to “whistle-blowers”, they’re not “rats”, they are trying to affect positive change and protect vulnerable fellow human beings.
Frank..true..right now the HSE culture regards whistle blowers as traitors and dissenters and destroys them totally,without exception…often at great financial and morale cost to the HSE.
I have personal experience of making complaints to senior management about unacceptable practices not by frontline staff but by management. After a long and arduous process including a prolonged episode of depression, I no longer work for the service, my career as a nurse/care worker is finished and all of the people who stood over the unethical practices are still in their jobs.
They should be publicly flogged. It makes my stomach turn to think this was going on and it was falling on silent Ears.
Manager who didn’t act on complaint should be sacked along with perpetrators.
The perpetrator should be locked up and the keys thrown in the river.
Don’t be so dramatic. But yes they absolutely should be seriously punished.
HIQA should do unannounced spot checks on these homes
Sheila..HIQA have been complicit in the “management”of some of these abuse cases that led to the removal (promotion) of the abuser.the “unannounced” spot checks are part of the charade.
It makes you want to get sick and very fearful of getting old or very sick.
You’d really have to wonder about the calibre of the vetting system when it comes to those looking after the vulnerable. We had a trainee Montessori teacher convicted of taking obscene photos of a small child. It then transpired that he suffered from social and educational deprivation. Now this. But then if you insist on paying the minimum wage for such jobs, you will find it hard to get the necessary dedicated professionals
Not in anyway condoning any form of unkindness to an elderly or vulnerable person, have a parent cared for at home through a private agency, the ladies who help out are fantastic, some most definitely not doing it for the money,
Problem being most cannot afford private care within the home… home care packages provided by the the state can only cater for a few hours max care a day in the home. This I must add would be someone with full care /nursing care needs. If everyone could afford private care within the home our hospitals would no longer be over crowded and we would not need to resort to a long term facility to have our needs met or in these cases not!
Depressing.
Management.
Management.
Management.
There should be mandatory 20yr sentence for any staff member (supposedly in a role of caring for the most vulnerable of us) who is found guilty of negligence, abuse or downright torture. It is one of the darkest aspects of Irish society and we have to stop it.
Such behaviour by someone who is employed to care for those in the final days of their lives is disgusting and those who abuse vulnerable people in their care should receive very long prison sentences so as to deter anyone else who might do the same.
I live in England and we constantly get recorded footage of the worst kind of abuse happening to elderly people who are unable to defend themselves by those employed to care for them but again when you pay peanuts for such care you will get those who would fail a job application for flipping burgers at McD’s.
I’ve got my money set aside for a trip to Dignatas in Zurich as soon as I feel my time is coming to an end and I can no longer care for myself so I will never have to suffer at he hands of such inhuman lowlifes who are accepted as “carers” these days
Hopefully Dignatus will set up shop somewhere in Ireland soon. No one should be forced to stay alive if they have to suffer like this.
Note how management positions/titles render their holders impervious to complaints and incapable of wrongdoing?
Just because someone complains and makes allegation against a staff member or organisation it doesn’t mean there true.
Correct, which is why action should be taken by management to investigate. Doesn’t appear that happened in the featured complaints. No substantive action taken. That does not sound like the complaints were taken seriously. If they were investigated, and they were found to be baseless, wouldn’t that also be mentioned in the FOI documents?
@pete. I always find people who start a sentence with ‘Just Because’ have something to hide or are defending someone close to them. All allegatiibs should be investigated, monitored & if necessary cctv should be installed … ‘Just Because’
Too much is overlooked in the name of saving money. That’s what it boils down to a lot of the time. I’ve also seen some carers who had full job security and think they can do what they like. This really annoys me as I know a whole host of young newly qualified people who choose this area and are brilliant carers but all on short contracts and basic money. I have heard some horror stories. The truth is though until Aras Attracta most people had a kind of ” it will do” attitude to caring for learning disabled adults. That lack of dignity was ok as long as they weren’t being beaten. I think seeing how helpless and trusting the adults were in Aras opened peoples eyes to just have vulnerable they were and are.
When visiting these so called homes, its evident that CCTV cameras are installed all over the complex – especially the car parks. CCTV should be made mandatory in each and every room of these homes as well as common areas. I would much rather lose a dash of my privacy in place of my security. Lets face it, if you’re old and close to leaving this world, there isn’t much you would be doing that you wouldn’t want others to see. If my parents were in a place like this, I would opt to have 24 hour CCTV set up in their room.
Unfortunately, you may be right. CCTV is an answer but if I was a carer and I was doing nothing wrong, doing my job, which is a tough job and I can only admire people who do this kind of work, I would feel demoralised and untrusted. The real problem is that management are not acting on complaints.
Unfortunately he is not right as the privacy of the individual in care is paramount therefore you can’t have cameras in every room of the house
If this was one of my Parents receiving that treatment, the Richter Scale wouldn’t be able to measure what I’d bring.
We need an undercover person working in all places to keep a check on things.
Bit like under cover boss.
And our generation are horrified by the abuses in the Magdeline Homes!!Nothing changed, except the “caregivers”. The vulnerable remain vulnerable. Can’t blame the Nuns for the present day abuses. Maybe we Irish just have a bad streak in us. So so sad. I agree with the writer about the seismic reaction. Unfortunately,I think this abuse happens to those who have no family presence at the homes. Again, so awful, so sad, so embarrassing to our present day society.
And they want to keep the recovery going!!!!! What a truly appalling way to treat our senior citizens. This is what happens when we place a higher value on economics than we do on people. These people paid their taxes. They contributed to society. What does it say about us that this can happen? Where is the monitoring and accountability that should go hand in hand with the neo liberal agenda being driven by the EU and by our own government. It is there for education so why not in health. Where is our Welfare State? The HSE is a failed entity. This should concern us all.
All carers should be subject to a suitability test & constant monitoring. Not everyone is suited to this work. My experience is, many people employed as carers are stay at home mothers, and look upon their job as a handy ‘few bob’. Caring is a vocation & Not a job.
They will need carers one day and fate has a twisted sense of humour…
I love the term “service user” – it is designed by organisations like the HSE to dehumanise and trivialise people
i work in a large Dublin hospital where patients are referred to as
clients – enough said
Loop de Loop !
Bodycams worn by caregivers would protect the vulnerable seniors and prevent false allegations against genuine staff. The data would only need to be accessed if malfeasance or neglect were alleged.
This may seem draconian, but abuse of dementia patients is right up there with child abuse. Some severe dementia patients would have less cognition than toddlers.
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