Our Values Are Openness, Honesty, Respect, Caring
Carers, cleaning staff, receptionists and caterers are cheerful, friendly, hard-working, skilled and empathetic.
By contrast, Abbeyfield’s management is distant, un-communicative, penny-pinching, incompetent and (occasionally) dishonest. Its value statement (shown at the top of this page) comes from an NHS template and, other than the 'Caring', gives a pretty inaccurate view of the organisation.
Grove House, Abbeyfield the Dales, Ilkley is part of a nationwide group of charities that mainly provide supported living but also offer standard care home accommodation, known in Ilkley as the Residential Unit.
Abbeyfield claims to have 'expertise in dementia care provision', but provides only limited training. Pre Covid19, up to a quarter of the residents had a form of the condition, one that does not involve anti-social behaviour such as violence or wandering. Now, post-pandemic, at least 90% have the illness.
We suspect that many of the issues noted in this review will be found in most care homes [though we only have experience of one other, a highly regarded MHA home: when we collected my mother at the end of a period of respite there we found her soaked in stale urine].
This review is based on our observations during a residency of 9 years.
at the start of my mother's residency in 2013. However, things improved over the years, with a particularly marked improvement in the final few months of my mother's life.Meals are from a kitchen run by proper chefs and are varied, plentiful and of good quality.
The staff, together with visiting nurses, did a good job maintaining my mother’s skin, so preventing pressure sores.
Supervision during the night was, we think, mainly good.
Early in her residency, my mother’s clothes were often stained, her hair untidy, her chin unshaved and her fingernails uncut. One friend was so upset that she took her clothes home and washed them. In those days, we regularly found soiled and smelly knickers that she'd secreted in drawers: responding to our complaints, the staff gradually got into the habit of checking all the hidey-holes and things improved. At times my mother’s teeth and dentures were not being cleaned and her dentist’s instructions were not always followed.
We once found a facecloth that had been used to clean her bottom and groin area.
We thought a bit more effort could have been made, when getting her ready to go out, to make my mother as presentable as she would have wanted: she was often sent out with her hair a mess, with no makeup and wearing unsuitable and uncoordinated clothing that belonged to other residents.
The care staff are kind, cheerful and friendly. Always amenable, they would boost anyone’s spirits. They always spoke to my mother respectfully and treated her as the individual she was.
Although most of the staff have an abundance of empathy and are well able to deal with residents who have mental health issues, specialised dementia training is not provided. One evening, when the staff could not cope with my mother’s agitated state, we were called and begged to come and calm her down.
Pre-pandemic, staff seemed to have plenty of time available to talk to residents but this was not seen as part of the job: one carer who did chat to my mother was criticised by other staff members for neglecting her duties.
We suspect that the people who chatted most to my mother were the cleaners who did her room.
There was a remarkable turnaround in 2021, however: we often saw carers sitting with, and talking to, residents.
Although managers claimed that my mother was regularly taken down to the courtyard during nice weather, we think this was a rare occurrence.
Abbeyfield employs up to 5 Activities Coordinators, one of whom is supposed to be attached to the Residential Unit. But there were often long periods when no-one organised activities for the residents.
Outside excursions, which my mother enjoyed immensely, were few and far between, sometimes only twice a year. The minibus, which is owned by another organisation, can only take 2 wheelchairs and not all drivers are trained to operate the lift.
The local NHS Trust provided a hospital bed, air cushions and a wheelchair. Abbeyfield provided hoisting equipment.
My mother’s room was fairly spacious, with a large ensuite bathroom.
The Residential Unit, for 16 residents, has a small dining room and a large, comfortable lounge.
There is a small coffee bar downstairs and a pleasant, secluded courtyard.
My mother’s room was not redecorated when she moved in, nor was the carpet, which had signs of the previous resident imprinted on its surface, replaced.
When we asked for a new carpet, we were told to buy one.
The chipboard furniture was old and shabby. It was a struggle to get minor repairs done and it would usually take a prolonged campaign, sometimes involving the CEO, to get the go ahead for improvements.
The TV seemed to have been retrieved from a junk shop - it had an ancient, dirt-encrusted remote. When it finally conked out, we were obliged to buy a replacement.
Despite being recently built, the Residential Unit lacks storage space. As a result people’s rooms can resemble junk stores, being repositories for communal equipment, including hoists and wheelchairs, packs of incontinence pads, bedding, and boxes of medical dressings.
The deputy manager had a habit of moving the furniture around my mother’s room (and even removing some items) without consultation. While there may have been good reasons for doing so, changing the scenery can be disconcerting for dementia sufferers. It never occurred to anyone in management to consult us, my mother’s representatives, about such things.
Although there is a large, fully equipped laundry, it’s the care staff who have to operate it. There is no adequate system for tracking residents’ clothes: my mother’s regularly disappeared and other people’s clothes often appeared in her wardrobe.
Flowers in vases and plants in pots were often allowed to go dry.
Car parking is limited: spaces are mostly taken up by cars belonging to staff or visiting professionals. There are no spaces reserved for the relatives of residents.
Cleanliness, Hygiene, Safety and Security
Clear improvements were made over the 9 years of my mother's residency. The Covid19 emergency was one catalyst for change: because managers had advance notice of our visits (we had to book the day before), they were able to ensure that her room was clean and tidy.
There were seldom any bad smells in the Unit.
All members of staff were skilled in the use of the hoisting equipment.
We once found tablets in one of Mum’s pockets, evidence of poor supervision: she'd been handed the tablets and, rather than swallow them, put them in her pocket.
They once failed to administer a prescription: the manager claimed it was to be given only when needed, but eventually admitted that it had been mistakenly put in the wrong cabinet.
An accident occurred when my mother’s thigh was scalded by a cup of hot tea she’d just been handed. The Registered Manager tried to avoid talking about it. No action was taken. It was left to us, the relatives, to educate the staff in preventative measures: we bought plastic aprons, posted advisory notices and mentioned the issue to every member of staff we encountered. It took about 18 months before they all (except agency workers, who never seemed to get adequate hand-overs) learned not to give my mother scalding-hot tea.
Another potentially serious incident occurred when my mother’s toe was degloved. This was caused when carers ignored instructions on the use of a toe protector. The incident was exacerbated and prolonged by a management cover up. The Registered Manager never apologised and never referred to it. We filed a formal complaint, telling her bosses she was a detached manager, having a reputation for hiding in her office, so avoiding responsibility for what went on in her Unit. At the enquiry, the investigator defended her, claiming she was highly regarded by other professionals. But we knew differently: her own staff despised her.
And finally, Abbeyfield tried to get my mother to pay for a private mobility assessment, when it is every care home’s legal responsibility to provide this service without charge.
Management / Documentation / Communication / Logistics
The last six months of my mother’s residency saw a marked improvement in documentation, communication and logistics. We put this down to an intake of young Senior Carers sweeping into the Unit with fresh, super-efficient new brooms.
We made around 700 visits to the Residential Unit over the years. Only twice did we see a member of the administrative staff there. The care staff used to tell us they never heard from the CEO unless it was to criticise them. We got the impression that the Unit is seen as a sideline and a bit of a distraction from Abbeyfield’s main activity, which is supported living.
Communications from management are restricted to necessary things such as Coronavirus rules, Care Plan reviews and next year's increase in the fees.
There is absolutely no interest in any suggestions for improvements that relatives might come up with.
Abbeyfield’s phone system illustrates the lack of thought given to communications: it is hard to get through on the phone. If staff are busy with a resident, they (rightly) will let the phone ring and ring; you cannot leave a message; and there is no other means, even in an emergency, of getting through to the Unit.
Nobody in the Grove House management team seems to have any idea of how to relate to the people who pay their salaries (over the years my mother spent £400,000 at Abbeyfield). When she died we received neither a sympathy card nor any other official acknowledgement of the event. Abbeyfield sent no-one to represent the organisation at her funeral.
It was always difficult to get managers at any level to respond to problems and complaints. Abbeyfield’s default tactics are to ignore, deny and obstruct.
For most of my mother’s residency, there was no effective means of finding out how she was doing. Being part-time, most staff don’t have the full picture. The Registered Manager and her deputy, who are the only full-time employees, seldom seemed to know what went on in their Unit. Keyworkers, designated to be a point of contact with relatives, were occasionally appointed, but were difficult to contact.
Daily Reports are compiled for residents but, until 2021, could not be viewed because the reports of all residents were lumped together in the same file.
In the early days of her residency, my mother’s Care Plan was a poorly written, confusing document that did not contain some vital information, such as the DNR instruction or her Mobility Assessment. The Care Plan has improved considerably since then, but is still a work in progress.
My mother had a phase when she would discard things that did not seem to belong to her, including letters. I authorised the home to withhold mail and pass it to me, her attorney. It seldom happened. A number of NHS and other appointments were missed as a result of letters disappearing. Unforgivably, we were twice told, wrongly, that the Queen had not sent a card for my mother’s 106th birthday.
We were often lied to. One year an Activities Organiser 'forgot' to make a booking for an over-90s party organised by a local group. The following year, we made sure she knew about the event. But no booking was made - she told us it was cancelled for care home residents because the group wanted to prioritise elderly folk who lived on their own, a perfectly laudable aim. Except that it wasn’t true: the organisers told me there was no such restriction.
For many of its activities, Abbeyfield relies on volunteers. It doesn’t offer them much support, though. One year, Pam and a friend put on a vintage clothes exhibition, which would have been of interest to many residents. But the event was so poorly advertised that only a handful of people turned up. The Activities Organiser could have arranged for a simple buffet to be served to the attendees but nothing, not even a ‘thank you’, was forthcoming.
As a final criticism of Abbeyfield’s administration, I will say, ‘check your bill’ – it will often be wrong.