Make care partners mandatory pleads NI families
Last updated 27th Nov 2020
Families who have loved ones in care homes across Northern Ireland have called on the Health Minister, Robin Swann, to make care partners mandatory.
The current guidance on visiting during the Coronavirus pandemic allows one person to have a face-to-face visit once a week.
However, families and Care Home Advice and Support Northern Ireland does not think these recommendations go far enough.
In a bid to keep pressure on the Department of Health around the issue, care home families supported by CHASNI held a candlelit vigil at Belfast City Hall last night.
A daughter whose parents are both in a home told town Downtown Radio and Cool FM how she has not been able to properly see her parents in eight months.
Up until July 2020 Beverly Moffett could have one socially distanced visit a week.
However, she explained both her parents have severe Alzheimer's, which means she needs to be able to touch her mother and father, she said:
“Before lockdown I would have visited every single day, from around the middle of July until about a month ago I was able to get a socially distanced visit once a week.
“However, it doesn’t work for my parents because my mum is totally deaf so she can’t hear a thing.
“She also doesn’t speak and looks down most times during visits, so socially distanced visits are basically useless.
“I need to be able to touch her and hold her hand to be able to show her some love.
“My dad can hear but he can’t really focus on anything that’s not in front of his face.
“Therefore, when he looks up at the ceiling at the lights, he doesn’t recognise the person at the other end of the table two metres away, who is his daughter who he loves.”
The Health Minister issued recommendations to all health and social care facilities in Northern Ireland which encourages them to facilitate one face-to-face visit per week by one person.
However, families continue to hit-back because this is only guidance and some care homes are not allowing any visits at all.
Ms Moffett said testing should be made available to those who want to visit care home residents and be facilitated with full PPE so that families can embrace each other and show one another love.
She added: “My life has totally changed; my life beforehand was going to visit them straight after work then running home getting to eat and going back to the care home for the rest of the evening.
“They’re my parents I looked after them for years before they went into a nursing home, I gave up lots of my life and social life to do that.
“My parents basically became my children, my babies, and when they went into a care home, I promised them I would never leave them, and I’ll be there every day and now I can’t do that for eight months.
“I could get a phone call any day to say that their time is up.”
Mr Swann said he encourages all care homes to engage with the care partner scheme but has not confirmed that the guidance will become mandatory.
He said some establishments are nervous and want to manage risk and that engagement around the issue is ongoing.
Christina Girvan’s father is in a care home that is facilitating weekly visits, but she thinks that the rules around care partners should be changed so that two family members can visit once a week.
She said she lives in constant fear that she will not get to embrace her father before he dies because of the restrictions.
She said: “It’s effecting me, in that, you wake up every morning and you go to bed every night and your last thought is, is the next time I’m going to get to physically touch my wee daddy when he’s dead?
“And you go to bed with that fear that maybe you’re going to get that call from the home to say something has happened and then you’re going to have to live with the legacy that you didn’t have time with them.