youcare. wecare. akaricare.
Friday, 3 April 2020
Update on Akari Care’s response to COVID 19 (Coronavirus) infection
03 April 2020
The wellbeing and safety of our residents and staff members remains our most important priority at the current time. We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our residents and their families and friends for their ongoing understanding as Akari Care continues to respond to the COVID 19 virus. The purpose of this notice is to provide an update on our response to the virus since our last update provided on 18 March 2020.
Families and friends
Our care homes continue to be closed to families and friends for all non-essential visits. Visiting our care homes will only be permitted in exceptional circumstances and must be arranged directly with the Home Manager or person in charge by telephone.
All of our care homes now have tablets in place that can be used for families and friends to enjoy remote contact with our residents through Skype or WhatsApp. Facilities for telephone calls remain in place. Our staff are also continuing to support residents with letter writing.
We are also endeavouring to keep our news and social media platforms regularly updated with activities and day to day life in our homes. Links to these platforms are as follows:
Twitter – https://twitter.com/akaricare
Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/akaricarehomes/
News – https://akaricare.co.uk/news
We are doing our best to make sure that life within our care homes remains as comfortable and normal as possible, whilst respecting and following the Government’s continuing guidance.
Health and social care professionals
Health and social care professionals continue to be supported for essential visits. We are grateful to health and social care visitors for their adherence to our hygiene protocols. It remains of paramount importance that visitors carefully follow instructions set out on notices within our care homes and provided by our staff.
Our staff teams
We are very grateful for the ongoing messages of support that have been sent to our staff teams across all of our care homes. Our fantastic staff are working very hard, in sometimes difficult circumstances, to maintain the wellbeing of all our residents. We are extremely proud of our staff team and thankful for their commitment to our residents.
In line with the rest of the population, we have a higher number of staff than usual who are either sick or in isolation. We are working towards maintaining our staffing levels through the use of overtime and the use of other staff who are able to work flexibly with us.
We are also actively recruiting additional staff and volunteers to provide further resilience in maintaining staffing levels and providing cover for staff who are self-isolating or shielding. Our recruitment and training teams are working hard to bring new staff on board and ensure that they are available to start work as soon as possible.
Maintaining staffing is a continuous challenge for all our care homes and we are dealing with this as a priority.
Protecting our residents and staff
We continue to operate a number of safety measures to protect our residents and staff from COVID 19. These measures are subject to continuing review as Government guidance is revised and also seek to take account of local facts and circumstances within each of our care homes.
All permitted visitors to our homes must carefully follow instructions set out on notices within our care homes and provided by our staff. These notices are being updated as guidance changes and it is important that all visitors to our homes carefully review these notices prior to entering our care homes. Any visitor who refuses to adhere to the instructions provided will not be permitted to enter our care homes.
Under no circumstances should you visit one of our homes if you currently feel unwell, have displayed any of the following symptoms or have had contact with anyone displaying these symptoms:
It is of critical importance that all permitted visitors to our care homes wash their hands thoroughly with soap and water immediately on entering our care homes. If for any reason soap and water are not available, then hand sanitiser gel may be used instead. All visitors must continue to practice good hand hygiene during the course of visits to our care homes including regularly washing their hands during their visits and prior to leaving the care home.
We have also now deployed across all of our care homes, additional hygiene procedures and we continue to ask all
permitted visitors to allow our staff to mist their hands, face and clothing with a water-based liquid to further manage infection risks within our homes. This solution is non-harmful to skin or clothing but gives greater assurance that infection risks are being managed.
Our procurement team is working very hard to ensure that staff and residents have access to appropriate protective equipment in all of our homes including masks, gloves, aprons and other equipment. We are continuously monitoring guidance provided by Public Health England, the NHS and Local Authorities in this area and reflecting changes to this guidance in the protective wear that we are seeking to procure. Like all organisations (including the NHS) this equipment is not always easy to obtain due to supply shortages in the UK and elsewhere in the world. However, continuing to source protective equipment from our existing supply chains and new suppliers that we find, is a priority.
We appreciate that this continues to be a worrying time and the current and continuing safety of our residents, staff and visitors is our main priority. We will continue to review our procedures on a day to day basis, based on advice and guidance received. We will update our website with any significant changes to these procedures.
If you have any concerns or questions, please do not hesitate to contact your Home Manager or person in charge by telephone in the first instance and we will keep you updated with any further developments. Alternatively, please contact us by email at [email protected]
Thank you for your continuing support and understanding.
Karen Harkin
Chief Operating Officer