HSE deploying resources to reduce Covid-19 threat at Kerry nursing home 'in chaos'
Nursing The Picture File Home Oaklands
The HSE is doing everything it can to minimise the impact of Covid-19 on a Kerry nursing home.
The executive took control of the Oaklands nursing home in Listowel yesterday after a district court hearing was told it was 'a centre in chaos' where there was a 'serious risk to life.'
The HSE is making alternative arrangements for its elderly residents on foot of an order sought at short notice in court.
HSE director general Paul Reid has said that the HSE is doing everything that needs to be done at the Oaklands nursing home in Kerry, control of which was taken over by the executive on Thursday.
Resources had been deployed to support the nursing home where measures on prevention and control, hygiene and ‘cohorting’ were being undertaken, he said.
The HSE has been working very closely with Nursing Homes Ireland with up to 10 nursing home at present on a red “high alert” status, he told RTÉ radio’s .
High level supports, including clinical supports were in place.
Serial testing which alerts the HSE which nursing homes are at risk had greatly helped the sector, he said, with 100 nursing homes, out of a total of more than 2,000, under watch.
A HSE team who entered the Oaklands nursing home on November 4 on foot of residents testing positive “found a centre in chaos”, deputy chief inspector Social Services and Hiqa, Susan Cliff said at the court hearing.
There had already been "a high level of concern" and this year there had been seven inspections.
During the November 4 visit, residents were found 'wandering unsupervised' with some who had tested positive for Covid-19 mingling with those who had not.
Residents with coughs and temperatures were not being monitored, and there were "no restrictions or checks on people coming or going" to the centre.