This article is from page 12 of the 2006-11-21 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 12 JPG
AN UNANNOUNCED Health Service Executive (HSE) inspection of the Lakes Nursing Home in Killaloe found the standard of hygiene all over the nursing home to be very poor.
The inspection took place in September. In a formal response to the HSE, mananagement at the home blamed ongoing building works, stating that they did not expect a repeat of these exceptional circumstances in future.
In the HSE report, the inspectors stated “at the inspection, the standard of hygiene all over the Nursing Home is very poor”.
To date, the HSE has now inspected six Clare nursing homes.
In the latest tranche to be published, a clean bill of health was given to Cahercalla Nursing Home, St Domnic Savio, Liscannor and St Theresa’s Kilrush.
The Lakes nursing home is registered for 57 patients and during inspection, there were 48 residents on site.
The hairdressing room was very dirty on the day of inspection with a large amount of cut hair swept towards the wall but left on the floor . . . the overall condition of this room appeared very dirty, according to the report.
It found that several bedrooms were in need of repainting and that a thorough cleaning of the premises should be undertaken immediately.
It goes on: “The Nursing Home Inspection Team was concerned to see a very large crack in the floor in room 50 . . . the team strongly advise a structural assessment be undertaken immediately and remedial work be undertaken as soon as possible in the interest of health and safety.
“The Nursing Home Inspection Team is disappointed to note that the promised recovering of the sitting room floor has not yet been done.”
A spokeswoman for the Nursing Home said yesterday that all items that were highlighted by the HSE inspection were addressed within seven days.
The formal response to the HSE Inspection report stated: “The building of the 28 assisted living units in the adjacent site has generated a large amount of dust over the summer which was beyond our control. . .
It goes on: “We have spoken with the hairdresser – who is not in our employ – and we do not expect a recurrence of this control failure.
“We are currently seeking quotations from our builders on a repainting of the interior . . .
“We would like to confirm that a cleaning schedule for the home is in place and . . .the crack in the upstairs floor in room 41 and 50 had already been previously inspected by our architect and he confirmed that it is a settlement crack and not a structural crack.