Care Home Survey Highlights Team Strengths In Covid Response

Managers of a group of 21 care homes in the south with up to 1,000 residents have said responding to lockdown constraints has strengthened their staff teams.

Respondents to a survey of Colten Care Home Managers and Clinical Leads said having to manage the impact of Covid-19 has made staff work ‘even better as a team’.

They said they had been able to offer support and reassurance to residents at the same time as ensuring staff have the help they need too.

There was praise from all respondents for ‘concise, timely and informative’ communications from Colten Care throughout the pandemic.

And all were confident their homes would remain resilient should there be future waves of the virus.

Among the Home Managers who took part in the survey, 100% feel proud of how they have coped with Covid in their homes and agree they have been able to offer great support and reassurance to their residents.

Lucy Yao, Regional Support Manager at Outstanding-rated Ferndown home Amberwood House, said: “The survey gave us a good opportunity to reflect on what we have needed and ensure the right support is in place.”

Elaine Farrer, Colten Care Operations Director, said: “We will continue to develop resources to increase the resilience of our managers in responding to the challenges of Covid, reassuring our residents and supporting staff.”

As well as Covid, the survey covered areas such as job demands, wellbeing, work-life balance, roles and responsibilities, career development, systems and processes, and communications.

On career development, all respondents praised Colten Care for providing good opportunities to progress for its Nurses, Senior Care Leads, Trainee Nursing Associates, Senior Companionship Team Members and Senior Administrators.

Among other insights, 100% of Home Managers believe Colten Care encourages them to exceed residents’ expectations, all feel they have support from their line manager to do their job well and all agree Colten Care is a great place to work.

All respondents feel the company is good at identifying and developing talented people and rate it as an ‘employer of choice’.

More than 85% of Home Managers expect to still be working for the company in three years’ time, a higher proportion than a previous survey showed in 2016.