Care residents ‘badly let down’ over handling 
of complaints

Robin Swann was responding to the findings of an independent report on how complaints related to Dunmurry Manor Care Home were handled.

The Alliance MLA Paula Bradshaw has said the report reinforces the need for a fully independent care home regulator.

The probe was one of a series commissioned by Mr Swann’s department in response to a damning 2018 report by the commissioner for older people into care at Dunmurry Manor.

At the time Dunmurry Manor was run by English company Runwood Homes.

It is now under new management and has been renamed Oak Tree Manor.

Commissioner Eddie Lynch’s 2018 report, titled Home Truths, listed a litany of failings in the care provided in the home, prompting him to make 59 recommendations to seven relevant authorities related to care provision, inspections and management.

The report published yesterday into the complaints procedures criticised how the concerns of residents and their families were handled.

Among the findings, the report stated: “Runwood did not seek to engage with complainants to fully understand their complaints; nor did it engage the relevant HSCTs (health and social care trusts) to address complaints that were of a care management nature; and some families were shortchanged with conditional apologies, for example, ‘I am sorry if you were upset’.”

The report did not confine its criticism to Runwood Homes.

It said the inspection body the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority (RQIA); the Health and Social Care Board: the HSCTs involved with the home; and Patient and Client Council (PCC) all did not adequately address the complaints.

“They appeared not to understand that making a complaint is stressful, exhausting and demanding,” added the report.

The independent review team made eight recommendations aimed at improving complaints procedures across the healthcare sector.

“I am committed to improving the outcomes for individuals who wish to complain about health and social care services to ensure that service users, carers and their families’ voices are heard,” said the minister.

“It is very clear that residents of Dunmurry Manor and their families were badly let down when it came to how complaints were dealt with. This has been a recurring challenge in the health and social care system and processes must be improved.

“People need to know who to turn to when services are failing them and their loved ones and they need to be assured that their complaints will be taken seriously and acted upon.”

South Belfast MLA Paula Bradshaw, who sits on the Stormont health committee, said: “Some of what appears in this review is scarcely believable, and my first thoughts are with the families of those in care, whose complaints were handled so poorly and who were themselves treated so badly.”

She said the review shows the need for a regulator “which is entirely independent of the department”.