Showing posts from January 2013

App to tackle loneliness wins social care Dragons' Den contest

An app that helps families separated by geography stay in touch with loved-ones at risk of loneliness triumphed in a recent Dragons' Den-style contest to identify innovative solutions to adult social care's funding crises.

Training - Why Bother?

Attending training courses can often seem like a chore and not the best way of utilising your free time and sometimes even your day off!

However if you want to deliver the highest standard of care possible, it’s vital to have up to date training and you never know, you might just enjoy it!

Recently training has been identified as a key factor towards improving the Care Industry and fighting issues such as Safeguarding of Vulnerable Adults. 

Paul Burstow MP has introduced a new bill to include a new offence of corporate neglect in the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

 In this he stated:

‘We need a complete shift in the way care workers are viewed by society by recognising them as professionals. They should be paid and trained as such.’

‘Jobs are usually underpaid and under trained, which means there is a serious lack of skills.’

The Prime Minister has announced the Care Quality Commission will do a ‘root and branch review’ of induction training for care staff. The review is to ensure that nobody can provide unsupervised help without an appropriate level of training. New minimum training standards for care staff will be published within weeks.

At Routes we already recognise the importance of training for all our staff working with Vulnerable Adults.

All our staff attend Mandatory Training on induction and Annual Training to keep up to date with changes in policies, procedures and legislation. There are also a number of courses staff can attend for on-going development.

I think that it’s a really positive step to see new minimum training standards being introduced and this will help to achieve the outcome we all want – To Provide an Excellent Standard of Care!

For further information:

http://www.number10.gov.uk/news/friends-and-family-test-nhs/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/social-care-network/2013/jan/22/change-law-protect-vulnerable-people

Routes Healthcare North Ltd achieves Qualsafe Awards for high standards of training

We are delighted to announce that Routes Training have now successfully obtained our training centre approval with Qualsafe Awards. 

We have met the very high standards required to be a Qualsafe Awards recognised centre, this will enable Routes Training to offer Offqual regulated qualifications. Qualsafe Awards is an Ofqual recognised Awarding Organisation, established by experts in the first aid training industry.

Being recognised by Qualsafe is evidence that we provide our staff with the highest standard of training to ensure our clients receive the highest standard of care.

Listed below are the First Aid courses Routes Training now provide:

• Level 2 Award in Emergency First Aid At Work (QCF)
• Level 2 Award in Paediatric Emergency First Aid (QCF)
• Level 2 Award in Paediatric First Aid (QCF)
• Level 2 First Aid at Work Annual Refresher
• Level 3 Award in First Aid at Work (QCF)

To read more about Qualsafe Awards please click here.

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Feeeling TATTered? (that's Tired All The Time): As one in five say they always feel drained, our experts share their fatigue tips.

Are you tired all the time? It’s a symptom so  common it even has a handy acronym – TATT – used by doctors on medical notes.

One in five Britons say they are, according  to NHS figures, with one in ten suffering long-term problems. Yet just a third  of these will have anything physically wrong with them, making it a tricky  problem to tackle.

Although causes such as hormonal problems or  vitamin deficiencies must be ruled out by blood tests, once this is done, what  is left to try?

We know that burning the candle at both ends  can leave you feeling drained, but there are scientifically proven ways to beat  the slump.

Here, experts reveal their favourite methods,  from cutting out a nightly tipple to limiting time spent on your  laptop.

To read the full article click here.

Researchers claim NHS drug decisions 'are flawed'

The formula used by the NHS to recommend which drugs should be funded is "flawed" and should be scrapped, researchers say.

The European Commission-funded study tested the assumptions of the system used by NICE (the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence).

Researchers concluded the watchdog's system failed to reflect variations in views on illness and disability.

To read the full article, click here.