SPECIALIST FACILITIES A number of causes
Lindsey Bratton and Mary-Jane Hoyle explained that the causes of PMLD are varied – and range from conditions such as cerebral palsy, to brain injury as a result of a car accident. The latter said: “Individuals with PMLD have very significant learning disabilities; they’re often non-verbal, double incontinent, unable to hear, and wheelchair users. They tend to need adapted housing equipped with special equipment.” She continued: “Dales House grew quickly, and has done really well. We base our care philosophy on family life; we don’t have cooks, cleaners, or staff rooms at our units; they are the members’ home, and we all muck in. Each facility is staffed 24 hours per day, but with the members doing everything they can domestically, in terms of tasks like laundry and cooking. The seventh bedroom at Dales House,” Mary-Jane Hoyle added, “was used as a respite room, and, with my own social work background and experience managing the facility, it became ever more apparent to me that there is a really urgent need within Hull and the wider East Riding for residential care homes for people with PMLD. The opening of the two new Market Weighton units will go a little way to meeting this.”
Adapting care as needs change Returning to Fossdale House and Langdale House, Lindsey Bratton reiterated that while providing respite care will be their primary role, some residents who become ‘really at home’ could live there for many years.
Mary-Jane Hoyle next explained how Westwood Care identified the site in Market Weighton. She said: “We were looking to buy some land in the east of the Hull, which we have now acquired, and plan to build a purpose-designed unit there. However, with the process quite protracted, we became increasingly aware of the urgent need for local young people with PMLD to be able to access respite, and the lack of available existing such care. Coincidentally, we were meeting one day, and the latest email about properties
for sale from a commercial estate agent arrived. I noticed there were two units near Market Weighton potentially suitable for both long-term and respite care, as well as for day care.”
Major elements of the ‘refurb’ Lindsey Bratton took up the story: “To cater for the user group, and working closely with Alex Caruso of ACA and a local construction company, Tokenspire, we have internally redesigned and refurbished the two units on the former Huntercombe site. Key elements have included widening doors for improved wheelchair access, slight reconfiguration of room layout, and installation of a lift.” The two separate ‘sister’ houses each have six bedrooms on the first floor, all with an en suite wetrooms; there is also a communal bathroom. On the ground floor are three different ‘lounges’ – a ‘TV room’, a day room, and a games room, plus a sensory room, an ADL dining room/kitchen, and a staff office, with a large wheelchair-accessible lift connecting the two floors. Mary-Jane Hoyle explained: “All activities will be supervised, but what we try to do is to make the facilities the least ‘clinical’ they can be. We clearly have to comply with key regulations, such as on fire safety, but the aim is for residents to experience a really homely feel from the moment they arrive.”
Varying pathways
“We want our members to feel they ‘own’ the space, and can be involved in every aspect – from cleaning and laundry, to gardening.” Members allocated a place, Mary-Jane Hoyle explained, may come via an NHS care or continuing healthcare pathway, while others’ residential care may be privately funded – for instance if they have won compensation for a serious injury or disability incurred in an accident.
Architect’s good ideas
While as a Victorian building that latterly housed an NHS community psychiatric team, Dales House required substantial refurbishment, Lindsey Bratton explained
that the buildings on the Market Weighton site had only been completed in around 2013, and thus required significantly less renovation. She said: “Alex Caruso has led, very skilfully, on the design for the interior refurbishment of the two buildings, coming up with some great ideas for us. The priority has been to make the new homes as non-clinical, comfortable, and welcoming as possible.” Mary Jane-Hoyle said: “Given the physical limitations of some of the members, however, we have incorporated features such as a lift between the two floors, wider doors and corridors, ceiling hoists, change table facilities in bathrooms, and easy access to en suites through bedrooms.”
Sensory room
She added: “We will be incorporating ‘objects of reference’ outside rooms, for instance with a toothbrush outside the bathroom, and a plastic knife and fork outside the dining room, and deploying different ways to provide information, such as using Easyread, which involves using symbols that are easily recognised to simplify messages. We will also use Makaton (a language programme designed to support spoken language that uses signs and symbols to help people to communicate), which all the staff use anyway.”
Fossdale House and Langdale House will have wheelchair-accessible paved areas at the front, while a shared garden at the rear will be developed to accommodate a wheelchair-accessible vegetable patch, some animals, pet care, and a sensory garden. Mary-Jane Hoyle said: “A lot of the members will really enjoy gardening and looking after animals. Through my own experience, I now have considerable expertise with people with PMLD and some of the challenges they face, and the things they enjoy, which I hope has enabled me to contribute valuable input.”
Lindsey Bratton added: “In the four years since we opened Dales House we have learned a great deal about how outstanding residential and respite care
The new ADL kitchen with wider access will allow residents and A ground floor day room. staff to eat together in a more domestic environment.
48 Health Estate Journal May 2019
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