Nursing Homes and Care Homes: We Need Them

In my pre-cripp working life (and for part of my post-disability working life), I went into a lot of group homes, day centres, and nursing homes as a Community Speech and Language Therapist. I saw a lot of truly awful things, but one of the most awful for me was always the lack of training staff were given, and the lack of respect and care they were repeatedly shown. Without a lot of training and support, no member of staff could cope with the demands of caring for someone with severe learning disabilities, mental health problems, and autism; even the best-prepared staff and visiting professionals like me struggled. I don't want to imply that I in any way condone what happened in Winterburn and Castlebeck: I don't. I will never condone it. I will continue to rail and to fight against it. I will continue to lie awake at night with my worries about vulnerable people impotently churning around in my head. I have reported more care environments more times than I care to remember to social work offices, to regulatory bodies, to the police... the list is endless. I was worn out with whistle-blowing, and it never seemed to change anything. There are other nursing homes that operate very close to the margins, financially speaking, and 'underperform,' and threaten entire chains of nursing homes with closure because owners and shareholders are dissatisfied with the return on their investment. There will be other stories like this; in fact, there are already, and we just haven't heard them. We've attempted to outsource compassion and caring, and the people in Winterburn are the casualties of our naivete and detachment.

Part of the cure has to be that staff are given training and a wage that lets them stick their heads above the poverty line. Another part is that there must be less hand-wringing and more accountability, but the regulatory bodies cannot manage that monumental task alone and for us. The disabled people abused in Winterburn are us; the people living in nursing homes on the brink of closure are us. They matter, as all human beings, regardless of age or frailty or disability or toileting needs matter.