A 6-week public consultation into the future use of some of our care homes was agreed by our Cabinet and launched this week.
As well as an online questionnaire, face-to-face meetings are being held with care home residents, their families and carers. There are three drop-in sessions where people can have their say.
Taking place across the county, the sessions will give people more opportunities to give their views or get support to fill in a questionnaire. The drop-ins are taking place in December:
- Monday 16 December, 10am to noon at Strutts Community Centre, Derby Road, Belper
- Tuesday 17 December, 9.30 to 11.30am at Staveley Library, Hall Lane, Staveley
- Tuesday 17 December, 10am to noon at Buxton Library, Kents Bank Road, Buxton.
Our cabinet member for adult care Councillor Natalie Hoy said:
“We want to give as many people as possible the opportunity to find out more about the proposals and ask questions which is why we’ve arranged the drop-in sessions and I’d encourage people to attend.
“It is important we provide the right support for people in the right place, ideally situated geographically, to support well-integrated assessment and reablement across the health and care system.
“Please be assured that no decisions will be made about any changes until we’ve taken everyone’s views fully into account.”
Last month, our Cabinet agreed to a range of measures which will support changes in the way we provide in-house care services for older people, including:
- creating wraparound care for the growing number of people with dementia and their carers, including long-term specialist dementia care coupled with day and overnight breaks for people living in the community
- continuing to run 6 day centres
- moving away from mixed model care homes, where both long-term and short-term residents are cared for, toward single model care homes
We also agreed to consult further on the future use of some of our remaining care homes after hearing of the decline in demand for traditional residential care services and the growing need for specialist care services for people with dementia and their carers.
Under option 1, 4 homes would operate as specialist dementia care homes - Florence Shipley, Meadow View, Oaklands and Whitestones - with all except Whitestones having an integrated day centre.
Under option 2, 2 homes would operate as specialist dementia care homes - Florence Shipley and Whitestones - with Meadow View and Oaklands adopting a mixed care model.
Under both options, we would cease to operate long-term residential and respite care at Ada Belfield, The Staveley Centre and Thomas Fields.
Under these proposals, the library adjoining Ada Belfield would not be affected.
For our preferred option, Staveley and Thomas Fields would be repurposed, alongside Bennerley, for hospital discharge beds, known as community support beds (CSB), providing a wide geographical spread of discharge beds across Derbyshire to help ensure people don’t stay in hospital longer than they need to and have a better chance of returning home after a hospital stay.
Councillor Hoy added:
“It’s vital we help people across Derbyshire to remain well at home and our proposals are aimed at supporting more people to be able to stay at home and live independently as long as possible, which is what they tell us they want.
“The number of elderly people in Derbyshire living with dementia has increased and data suggests that the total number of people over 65 potentially living with severe dementia across Derbyshire will sadly increase from 9,698 to 14,190 by 2030, so it is essential that the right support is available for our residents and their carers.
“We need to work more closely with our partners in health so we can help more people to remain at home and improve flow through the health and care system.
“By moving from mixed model care homes, where both long-term and short-term residents are cared for, toward a focus on single model care homes, we can create a more effective and efficient service to support more Derbyshire residents to live the life they want, independently at home, in their communities.”
The consultation to determine the future use of our remaining residential homes is open until 12 January 2025.