Caring for someone goes beyond meeting their basic needs: providing good care is taking the time to understand and respect a person’s wants and wishes, being a trusted companion in life, a shoulder at difficult times and showing compassion and kindness.
With any type of care, an exceptional level of comfort and a peaceful environment can be crucial in ensuring people’s wellbeing. In end of life care, security and comfort can play an even more important role in ensuring an individual’s dignity is appreciated and respected.
Treating residents with respect and compassion has always been central to our ethos at Rosebank. We recognise the importance of involving residents in discussions about their care, so they can voice their thoughts and opinions, which in turn enables them to make decisions entirely and exclusively based on their needs, wishes and interests.
However impaired a person’s cognitive and memory functions may be, residents will still have the capacity to feel comfortable or distressed, loved or lonely, at ease or frightened. Therefore, during this final chapter of a person’s life, it is imperative that residents are provided with opportunities to build meaningful and positive relationships through person-centred care that will enrichen their days and enable them to feel happy, loved and safe.
End of life care is described by the Department of Health and Social Care as being “the management of pain and other symptoms and provision of psychological, social, spiritual and practical support”.
The Gold Standard Framework (GSFCH), the Nationally recognised Quality Hallmark, describes it as, “living well until you die.” Rosebank became one of only two homes in Oxfordshire to be awarded Platinum Status for this award in May 2019, which is a testament to our excellence in end of life care.
GSFCH aims to improve the care for residents in the last years of life, to develop collaboration across boundaries and in doing so reduce avoidable hospital admissions.
Our philosophy to end of life care is centred around this approach. We work closely with other Health Care specialists to ensure all needs are anticipated and met, including psychological and spiritual support. We want residents to enjoy a rich and engaging life, both within the home, and as part of life within their local community.
The certification process includes assessment against 20 clear standards of best practice, reviewing the care of residents using the Quality Assessment Visit and the After-Death Analysis Audit Tool, and integration of the processes into everyday practice.
Due to the importance of end of life care to people’s wellbeing, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Matt Hancock, has very recently announced an investment of £25m in end of life care. We can’t stress the importance of this type of care enough: approximately 500,000 people die annually in England and Wales, with three-quarters of these people experiencing a progressive decline in both health and interactions with health professionals, with this number expected to rise by 10% by 2030 (Institute for Public Policy Research, 2018).
We take great pride not only in the level of high-quality care we provide but also in the level of health and happiness we are able to offer our residents in this chapter of their life.
From the moment we opened our doors, Rosebank has always been first and foremost our residents’ home. We want our residents to have wonderful experiences, and to live life to their absolute fullest. Rosebank is about our residents being surrounded by people who love them, where they feel safe and secure, and enjoy ‘living well until you die’.
Jane, and her husband Gerry, own and manage Rosebank Care Home and Churchfields Care Home, both set in West Oxfordshire. Since acquiring Rosebank in 2008, and most recently Churchfields in 2016, their ethos has been to provide outstanding long and short-term care for residents.
Gerry is a GP and Jane trained as a Nurse at Middlesex Hospital, London. For the last 15 years Jane has been involved in developing care homes.
