Safety failings are leading to elderly residents being seriously injured or even killed in Britain’s care homes.
People have died after leaping or falling from insecure windows while one resident was left wheelchair-bound after they fell down stairs after being drugged and left unattended.
There are also many cases of people suffocating after getting trapped between their mattress and the safety rails used to stop them falling out of bed.Support our Care Home campaignThe details, provided by the Health and Safety Executive, reveal more than 100 companies have been slated for failings.
Care firms have also been fined more than £1 million for flouting safety rules.
Caroline Abrahams, Charity Director at Age UK, said: “Any occurrence of older people dying from avoidable accidents or preventable harm is truly shocking and unacceptable. These incidents underline the need for robust inspection and swift action when problems are identified. These stories must cease. We need to stop failing our most vulnerable.”
Since 2011, the HSE has served almost 250 notices on more than 100 companies in Britain for safety failings. Scottish firms received 53 notices while those in England were given 174 and 20 were handed out to Welsh companies.
The majority were improvement notices, which order firms to make changes by a certain date. In addition, 18 companies have been fined a total of £1,245,600 for safety failings.
Three companies were found guilty of failings related to residents who died when they became trapped between their mattress or headboard and bed rails.
New Century Care Ltd was fined £165,000 in 2012 after Elsie Beals, 93, died after she became trapped between her mattress and incorrectly-fitted bed rails at Aden Court Care Home, in West Yorkshire, in 2010.
Similarly, Elizabeth Roberts, 89, suffocated in her room at the Headlands Nursing Home, in Llangollen, Wales in 2008 after she got trapped between the mattresses and bed rails. Owners Deevale Homecare and Services Ltd were fined £70,000 in 2011 as a result.
Sue Ryder Care was fined £65,000 in 2011 after 40-year-old Charlotte Young, who had Huntingdon’s disease, died at the Sue Ryder Care Home in Bamber Bridge, Lancashire after becoming trapped between a mattress and a bed rail in 2008.
Since 2001, there have been at least 25 bed rail related deaths in the UK, as well as numerous injuries.
The son of a woman who died in similar circumstances in 2001 has blasted the findings. Jim Jobling’s mother Elizabeth, an Alzheimer’s sufferer, suffocated after she caught her neck in a bed rail, while in care at the Beacon Farm Nursing and Residential Home in Cramlington, Northumberland. The company which owned the home at the time was fined £13,000 as a result.
Jim, 72, said: “Care homes need to know how to use these rails safely. These things are supposed to protect people, not kill them.”
A spokesman for the Health and Safety Executive said they provide extensive guidance to care home owners.
“There should be no excuse for care home providers not knowing the standards required to protect the very vulnerable,” he said.
The Care Quality Commission, which regulates homes in England, and the Care Inspectorate, which regulates homes in Scotland, said it is the responsibility of home owners to abide by safety rules.
However, both watchdogs said they take action to make sure improvements happen when they do discover failings or risks to residents.
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