A key part of what we do to empower individuals that we support is to help with the development of independent daily living skills that would allow them to move onto more independent settings. With this aim in mind, we are delighted to announce that we have purchased our first home that we will soon start working on to convert into a shared supported living home. 

Supported living is an alternative to residential care homes, where individuals will be provided the same high levels of support but in a more independent setting. 

This means that some of the individuals that currently live in residential settings will be able to move into more independent settings when they are ready, and be assured to receive the same high quality of support that they have become used to with us, but in a more independent environment. 

To head up this new offering we are delighted to welcome Kerrie Lightwood to the management team at Godfrey Barnes Care. Kerrie come’s with a wealth of experience and knowledge of the sector having headed up a substantial portfolio of successful supported living schemes across the region in previous roles. 

In addition to this we are very proud to have partnered up with a reputable Housing Association that will ensure the needs of individual’s placed within this home are met to the highest standards and that any support requirements that they may have are always picked up.  

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As part of the Easter celebrations service users across all sites have taken part in planting sunflowers in their homes gardens. This will form part of a competition across sites to see which home can grow the tallest sunflower. Additionally there have been several garden parties, Easter egg hunts and lots more outdoor activities making the best of the amazing weather that we have been having and giving the service users a safe opportunity to get out and about whilst still under the lockdown.

Other activities have included creating a McDonalds themed dinner after a few of the service users mentioned that they would like to go. Due to lockdown we couldn’t, so the teams took this as an opportunity to make an activity with the service users and helped them make their very own home-made McDonalds meals! 

We always say that we are immensely proud of the teams we have and the amazing work and dedication they show, but in light of the challenges that we all face during this hard time words struggle to describe the immense feeling of pride that we have to work with such amazing teams and service users!

In these challenging times we’ve been taking the governments advice around social distancing to protect our service users and teams health as much as possible. to try and minimise the impact on everyone’s lives we’re trying to keep a sense of normality for all service users as much as possible, whilst working around the challenges that we all face as a society with things such as shortages in the shops and not being able to get out to do the normal day to day activities that are intrinsic parts of what we all do.

Instead we have set up alternatives within the homes such as setting up a tuck shop to get the service users to still take part in buying their weekly treats, changing the weekly menus to accommodate the changes with food items being available within shops and doing outside activities in the homes garden areas to ensure that everyone still gets the chance to get some fresh air daily and the chance to walk in the outdoors. 

To say that we are proud our all our staff would be an understatement!  The selfless approach that they have all taken to ensure that we maintain as much a sense of normality as possible in for all service users in these unprecedented times goes far beyond what would be expected – we’re lucky and proud to work with you all! 

As the Covid-19 situation continues to evolve, we have been continuously monitoring the official advice and responding accordingly. We have acted quickly and decisively to manage the potential impact of the virus, in line with guidance from the Government, and our local authority partners. We have implemented enhanced infection control protocols across all our homes to ensure the safety of all service users and staff. Providing updates and issuing instructions based on official Government advice, backed up by the Chief Medical Officer, avoiding hearsay, rhetoric and opinion. 

In addition to this we have replaced physical meetings with skype and telephone conferences to ensure we continue to provide business as usual whilst also safeguarding all service users and staff by eliminating all non-essential visits, greatly reducing the risk of introducing the virus into the homes.  Any essential visitors have been asked and observed by staff to carry out enhanced infection control protocols during their visits. 

In addition to this we have produced specific Covid-19 Risk Assessments for all our service users, which highlight any additional vulnerability that they may have due to underlying health conditions so that staff are clear about how to best keep them safe and what to do if they show any symptoms. 

Whilst contact with family and friends is an integral part of our service, individual service managers have been asked to review access to their homes to mitigate the risks for everyone, including staff and how cross infection may impact on our ability to maintain safe staffing levels. For this reason, the general consensus at the moment is to restrict access as much as possible whilst we develop a greater clarity on this fast-developing situation, in the best interest of everyone.