Donna's Blog

The elderly are being blamed as one of the biggest culprits in the current NHS ‘bed blocking’ crisis

Yes, they are more prone to hospital admissions due to their higher risk of falls, infections and general deterioration in medical conditions.

But no elderly person wants to be in hospital in a strange environment. They often can’t hear, see or understand the staff. All they want is to get better and go home!

Department of Health statistics show more than 680,000 elderly people are admitted to acute hospitals each year. They regularly languish on wards even though they are well enough to be looked after in a care home or at home with support.

The Government have promised a £300 million ‘rescue’ package to allow Social Services to buy care, but this is only a drop in the ocean.

50,000 care home beds have been lost over the last 5 years and care homes are closing at the rate of 4 per week. This is mainly because they are unable to meet the standards of care required by the CQC. Neither the NHS or Social Services pay care homes enough to be able to provide the high standards of care that the elderly deserve or CQC requries.

More intermediate care beds would help the situation but this comes at a time when community hospitals like Bakewell and Bolsover are due to close. These hospitals provide care whilst the elderly wait for either a care home bed or for a care package at home.

It costs £400 per day for a hospital bed. Is it just me or is the answer to bed blocking to use this money and save our community hospitals and pay more money towards care home beds and care at home?

NHS, I think you have the answer to the bed blocking crisis.

Donna Pierpoint is the manager of Sheffield’s renowned Broomgrove Nursing Home. She has 20 years experience in the sector, a decade of those as care home manager.

Crime Commissioner Alan Billings recently came to talk to our residents about how to tackle the growing problem of scam phone calls.

Quite a few of our residents have their own landlines and have received junk phone calls in the past. They have now all registered with the phone preference service to stop the marketing calls and they know what to watch out for. But they are, sadly, in a minority.

We have a growing elderly population, they are vulnerable and need to be alert to possible scams, especially ones made over the phone. Fraudsters target the elderly and even have to guts to pretend to be the Police, Council or Bank. They are convincing, conniving and are likely to come armed with information that makes them seem tototally genuine.

A 65-year old gentleman was scammed out of £12,000 recently. The fraudster purchased an 0845 number and stated he was from their bank. He left the number with the victim which, when dialled, was diverted to the scammer’s mobile phone. During the conversation the scammer managed to get the victim to divulge bank details, security information and PIN. The scammer then persuaded the victim that their account was at risk and a courier would be arranged to collect his bank card.

You may have read that and wondered why the gentleman didn’t suspect any harm, but these scammers can be very clever and so convincing that an elderly person could easily think it was genuine.

What can we do to help stop these con men and women robbing our elderly relatives?

They can sign up with the Telephone Preference Service to prevent marketing phone calls. Contact 0845 070 0707, or go to www.tpsonline.org.uk.

We must also ensure they never give out personal details over the phone; never send money to anyone they don’t know; don’t open the door to someone they don’t know; always ask who they are speaking to and verify the information by calling a company’s head office.

Remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Scammers are clever, they will do their homework and will often know huge amounts of information about the people they are targeting.

For more information, contact South Yorkshire Police and ask for ‘The Little Book of Big Scams’. This booklet has invaluable information on all kinds of scams and how to avoid them.

Care workers have recently been reprimanded by CQC for calling old people affectionate names like ‘sweetheart’, ‘love’ and ‘darling’.

They’ve said the labels are patronising and demeaning and the care home in question was marked down as a result. They ended up with a ‘requiring improvement’ grading.

Care workers argue that the use of these names make the older people feel loved. I really couldn’t agree more.

As shown in the recent John Lewis Christmas advert, many older people live very lonely lives.

In fact 17% of older people are in contact with family, friends and neighbours less than once a week and 11% are in contact less than once a month.

Over half (51%) of all people aged 75 and over live alone and two fifths of all older people (about 3.9 million) say the television is their main company.

Using terms of endearment makes older people feel loved and cared for and part of a family

But isn’t this more about dignity and respect, not what we actually call older people?

For example, at Broomgrove we have a lady who likes to be called Miss Robinson, and that’s what we call her, but we also have a lady who likes to be called Trixibelle, which was a childhood nickname. Many older people like to be called different names, these may be shortened names, like Peggy, for Margaret or Jim for James. Many use their middle names as their first names.

What this is really about is respecting the individual and asking them how they wish to be addressed and following their wishes. It’s all about effective use of communication. At their time in life it’s about feeling comfortable and loved.

This is also about local dialect. ‘Love’ and ‘duck’ is used extensively throughout Yorkshire, even by total strangers when communicating. You’ll hear the terms from shopkeepers, bus drivers, all sorts of people – it’s common currency and it’s how we are up North! We are a friendly bunch. If we were more formal, wouldn’t that be cold and unwelcoming?

At Broomgrove we are a family and we talk to each other as a family would. Some of the residents call the staff ‘Sweetie’. The important issue is that people are called what they want to be called. Some will really appreciate affectionate terms of endearment, others will not.