Care home experiences during COVID-19 project

News - 29 September 2020

Have you or a loved one been living in a Wigan Borough care home during the COVID-19 pandemic? We'd like to hear your experiences.
Elderly woman smiling at the camera

Healthwatch Wigan & Leigh is currently working in partnership with Wigan Council to find out about the experiences of residents, families and staff in care homes across the Wigan Borough during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.

To begin with, this project will be focusing on 7 care homes. These are:

  • Ashwood Court
  • St George's
  • Hourigan House
  • Westwood Lodge
  • Belong Ltd
  • Ash Tree House
  • Lakeside

The aim of this project is to recognise and celebrate the hard work of care homes during this difficult period, whilst also gathering learning opportunities to allow improvements to be made where needed, for the benefit of all. 

Our focus will be on:

  • Safeguarding
  • Primary care provision
  • Discharge from hospital to care home

With support from Wigan Borough CCG, we will identify care homes and their primary care partners across the PCNs who are working to an Enhanced Care Home Service specification.

Our aim for this project is to gain an insight into residents of care homes and their families can celebrate the innovative practice and hard work that has taken place by care homes during the corona virus outbreak, as well as gathering learning opportunities for care homes, Local Authority and health services to enable improvements for residents into the future.

Interested in taking part?

Do you know someone who is currently living, or has lived, in a care home since March 2020? Maybe it's a parent, a sibling, an aunt or uncle?

If so, we'd love to hear your experiences. Please contact Karen Wilson so she can arrange a relaxed, friendly meeting over Zoom or Teams (or if you just need some more information):

karen.wilson@healthwatchwiganandleigh.co.uk

01942 834666

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Exploring the experiences of Care Home staff in accessing Health and Adult Social Care services for their residents post Covid pandemic.

This report contains the findings of a project undertaken to explore the current situation in care homes in accessing health and adult social care services. This was in response to anecdotal reports to Healthwatch Wigan and Leigh that some services were still running pandemic style models of service delivery.
From March 2020 the Covid pandemic had inevitably led to many restrictions on visiting in care homes for both family members and peripatetic health care staff. As a result, services adapted how they provided an input to this cohort of the population. Many assessments and advice were delivered via Zoom and Teams in a bid to keep people safe. In addition, at the height of the pandemic some but not all GP’s provided remote access services instead of in person visits. Quality checks and Inspection visits by the Local Authority and Care Quality Commission became very restricted as well. There have been anecdotal reports of ongoing difficulties accessing some
services; for example podiatry, dietetics and speech and language services, to name but a few, since restrictions have been lifted. Healthwatch Wigan and Leigh (HWWL) has received anecdotal reports that in some care homes visiting restrictions are still in place. It was identified at HWWL Advisory Board that it would be appropriate to conduct an engagement activity to explore the current situation.
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