The
Director of Adult Social Care and Health Integration will provide the panel
with a verbal update regarding adult day care services / provision.
Minutes:
The Director of Adult Social Care and Health
Integration provided Members with a verbal update regarding adult day care
services / provision; the following points were made:
·
The
Council operated a number of forms of day care, which was a purposeful activity
provided in response to identified / assessed social care needs.
·
Day
care for younger individuals acted as a dual function in that it provided
purposeful activity for the individual, whilst also providing respite for
parents / carers to allow them to attend work, etc.
·
Two
streams of day care were currently operated: in-house day care and specialist
provision. In-house day care was
delivered by Local Authority staff in Local Authority facilities and there were
three aspects to this:
–
Community
Inclusion – support was currently provided at Cumberland Resource Centre
(learning disability provision), the Pavilion at the Park (learning disability
provision) and Sandringham House (autism provision);
–
The
Orchard, which was a partnership between the Local Authority and Tees, Esk and Wear Valley (TEWV) Mental Health Trust, provided
specialist day care primarily for younger adults; and
–
North
Ormesby Resource Centre, which provided an older persons
day centre and a dementia focused day centre.
·
With
regards to the private sector, the Council currently contracted ten providers
to support individuals, predominantly in respect of learning disability
provision.
In terms of service provision and the impact of COVID-19, the following
points were made:
·
During
the initial stages of the pandemic and upon entering the first spike in cases,
decisions concerning the closure / suspension of day care services were taken
in response to the statistics provided by the government.
·
Since
this time, all efforts have been made to remain as flexible as possible. For example: in instances where individuals
could not enter day care services, staff provided support in domestic settings
to ensure that both purposeful and social contact was maintained.
·
There
had been periods of opening / closing facilities in line with government
directives, but day care provision had now resumed and was operating well. Reference was made to the progress achieved
in terms of operational changes, including in relation to risk assessments,
PPE, operation of bubbles and lateral flow and PCR testing, which had been
implemented with assistance from infection control experts, Contracts and
Commissioning officers and others.
·
In
some of the units, operating capacity had reduced relatively slightly. Some individuals had opted not to return to
day care; others had sadly passed away during the period, although this was
largely related to the turnover of individuals utilising day care and dementia
and older peoples’ units, as opposed to necessarily being a direct consequence
of COVID-19.
·
The
next step would be to resume services for those individuals living in
residential care and attending day care in different settings.
·
In
terms of statistics, it was highlighted that there had been a marginal
reduction in the number of individuals on the roll accessing day care across
community settings. Prior to the
pandemic there were 259 people on the roll; this currently sat at 190. In terms of capacity to accept individuals
across the various sites per day, prior to the pandemic this number was 172;
currently this was 141. It was
indicated, however, that this was not causing any acute problems.
During the discussion that followed, Members raised a number of queries
with the Director. In response, the following information was provided:
·
Transport
services had now resumed.
·
With
regards to the ten contracted providers, these were predominantly Middlesbrough-based
and were as follows: Aapna Day Care Service for Older
People – Milan; Autism Matters; Camphill Village
Trust; Earthbeat Theatre Company; Just a Job; The
Robin Centre; Teesside Ability Support Centre (TASC); Tees Valley Asian Welfare
Forum Limited (TVAWF Ltd); Yatton House Society; and
Young Persons Activity Group at Community Integrated Care.
·
Regarding
the statistics provided, it was explained that some individuals attended day
care once per week, others three days and in some instances five days, although
five days was unusual. There were
limitations on numbers at the present time owing to COVID-19 restrictions.
·
In
terms of the fluidity of the COVID-19 situation, Members were advised that
guidance was in place; advice provided by the government would be carefully
monitored and responded to accordingly.
The Chair thanked the Director for the information presented.
NOTED