Care Homes Policy

[The Colonel]

Ladies & Gents

I would appreciate your views on a subject put to me recently by a health and safety person in the care home sector. It has come to thier attention that a number of care homes catering for young persons with learning difficulties have one particular policy that they find difficult to come to terms with, namley;

In the evnet of a fire within the premises and a resident is unable to leave a room due to the fire or smoke then a member of staff must stay with that resident and not leave them alone, the staff member cannot leave them. Many persons with learning difficulties would not understand that they should not venture into a fire or smoke situation and put themselves at risk, so the policy is that a member of staff will stay with them and help secure the room until help arrives. One question was can the employers insist that one of thier employees puts themselves at risk by staying with the resident which has lead to some concern amongst staff.

I can understand the problem with persons with such learning dofficulties, does the duty of care for the residents extend to a member of staff putting themselves in danger. Not an easy one.

I would appreciate your views

[Tom W]

It is a tricky one but i would think that if they are unable to leave a room due to fire of smoke then how would a carer get to them through the fire or smoke? It just wouldn't work.

However if the fire alarm goes off, i would suggest that if they need to be supervised then i would like to see them all being taken to a refuge, not left in individual bedrooms etc. I would like to think that the staff would be trained in evacuation of these residents regardless of their abilities. If full evacuation is not achievable then a policy of gathering them all in an area would help and would require less staff to supervising them.

[Phoenix]

Agree with Piglet.

This policy is coming from the wrong angle altogether. 

If the fire precautions in the building are adequate then no one should ever be in a position where they cannot leave their room and make their way to a place of safety.  Because of the learning difficulties it might be necessary for members of staff to assist some residents to safety.  If they have adequate fire precautions this particular problem will vanish like a puff of (much discussed) smoke.

Stu

[Midland Retty]

This raises several questions

Firstly why would a carer be in a position where they are trapped with a resident during a fire? It seems to suggest that there would be insufficient time to detect a fire occuring and instigate an evacuation before escape routes became untennable.

Secondly, why does the carer need to stop with resident? Is it that some residents may have challenging behaviour and refuse to evacuate or don't comply with staff requests to evacuate? Or is it because the residents are immobile and staff can not move them?

Thirdly, how many staff are available at any one time to assist evacuating residents?

Lastly, what evacuation strategy is implemented? Is a full or phased evacuation?

  

[Mike Buckley]

It strikes me this policy has been written by a non H&S or Fire person. I can see the logic of having a carer stay with the person if they are trapped and I doubt if any carer would leave a person in those circumstances. However if the correct Fire Precautions are in place then it should not happen. If the correct precautions are not in place then this needs to be addressed.

Another approach could be to hold frequent fire drills so the residents know what they need to do when the fire alarm goes off. I suspect that once the residents know the drill they may well be better at evacuating the place than most full competent people are.

[wee brian]

Maybe they just read the care home guide - easy mistake to make

[Paul2886]

The above problems should never arise if  the fire risk assessment reflects the catagory of residents using the building.
Surely it would be understood that there will be a potential delayed evacuation with such residents, even to an interim safe haven.
The RA should reflect that and the necessary measures put in place. Poor care workers are probably the only employees that remain in a building when the fire alarm sounds to instigate an evacuation to a place of safety. They deserve the best fire precautions that money can buy so risk assessors must reflect just that

[The Colonel]

Gents

Thanks for your views so far, unfortunatly I dont have any further info to give you. I shall be back at the same location next week so may be able to gather more about the premises and policy.

Thanks

[Tall Paul]

Many of the res-care premises that I come across do not appear to have sufficient staff at night to carry out an effective evacuation - even to an adjacent protected area - and so the idea of losing one or more members of staff to stay with residents would be impossible and may not have been thought through from a risk assessment perspective.  Of course this may be a wealthy provider, well able to supply one member of staff for each resident, plus additional staff to respond to the alarm, investigate the zone, coordinate staff placements, liaise with the fire service and carry out any other associated duties... but I suspect not.

As stated in the previous posts, if the protection is required to the appropriate level, including additional protection if the nature of the occupants dictates it, then staff should not need to be set aside for this task.

Have you considered the use of a sprinkler system as a further risk reduction measure?

Paul