Autumna - SafeCareHomes

In 2019, Autumna was conceived with the purpose creating an extensive, online database of care services available to the public – a care provider directory more detailed and with more useful, searchable information than any other.

In addition to Autumna’s own ongoing research and data gathering, care providers would be able to use the easy-to-edit functionality of the website, to keep their own details up-todate and relevant, and to showcase their specialisations and unique qualities.

Autumna believes everyone deserves to be able to access a higher standard of care.

Autumna is therefore committed to helping everybody as best we can – and, using the choice that self-funders have, to improve standards and transparency across the entire elder care sector.

Our Latest Blogs

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Rob King

Guidelines

10 August 2020

PPE in Care Homes: What Are The Guidelines?

Shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE) amidst the Covid-19 outbreak has been a topic of controversy. Reports of a lack of PPE in care homes brings great concern to those with elderly or disabled relatives. People want to feel secure that loved ones residing in care are safe, and rightly so. If you’re looking for a summary of how PPE should be used and how safe care homes are at the moment, read our guide below. How PPE in Care Homes Should Be Used The Correct Order to Put on PPE in Care Homes Public Health England published this guide in April 2020 on how to use PPE in care homes. As shown above, the advice for care home staff to prepare is to make sure that they: Drink fluids before putting on PPE Tie back their hair Remove any jewellery Check that the PPE is the correct size Following this, staff members should do the following: Clean and disinfect their hands with either alcohol rub/gel, or soap and water. Put on an apron and tie this at their waist. Put on a facemask, with the upper straps positioned on the crown of the head and the […]

Rob King

Regulation

20 August 2020

CQC Reports During Covid-19 — Find Safe UK Care Homes

CQC reports are one of the best ways to keep track of how safe care services are. But how is the CQC responding to the Covid-19 pandemic? And where should you go to find information you can trust about UK care homes’ safety measures? Read this article to find out more about the current state of affairs. What Is the Care Quality Commission’s Role Right Now? In June 2020, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) released an update. This update was to let the public know about how the CQC are changing their way of work during the Covid-19 pandemic. CQC inspections and ratings are vital to maintain the quality of care services in England. The Care Quality Commission’s role is to independently regulate health and adult social care providers. Their role remains the same pre and post-Covid. Rather, how they execute their role has had to change. Here are a few of the CQC guidelines at this time: Notifications Registered service providers must notify the CQC of certain events or incidents, such as allegations of abuse and service user death. Individual cases of coronavirus do not require CQC notification. Registration Health and social care providers can apply for Covid-19 registration. […]

Rob King

16 December 2020

How to Choose a Care Home Air Purifying System

Make sure your system stops the risk of airborne aerosol transmission At the start of the Coronavirus pandemic, official guidelines from the World Health Organization (WHO) focused on addressing droplet transmission. It’s known that when people sneeze, cough, or talk they expel particles, which contain droplets and aerosols. Droplets are heavy and fall to the ground or surfaces within seconds and don’t travel far. As a result, experts advised care homes to focus on surface cleaning and hand washing to mitigate the spread of the virus. Now scientists have evidence that airborne aerosols can transmit the virus Aerosol particles are smaller, lighter and can linger in the air for hours and drift further, particularly indoors, causing potential transmission of the coronavirus. In a recent video the WHO recommends good room ventilation, or, where that is not possible, air purification devices that use HEPA filters. A paper by EMG under the UK Government on the role of ventilation presented to SAGE (Scientific Group for Emergencies) highlighted that ventilation should be integral to the COVID-19 mitigation strategy in multi-occupant spaces. The Guardian, The Times and The Daily Telegraph have all written extensive articles on the risk of COVID-19 airborne transmission. They report growing […]

WiFi Spark

15 February 2022

How the pandemic has shaped digital transformation – WiFi Spark

How the pandemic has shaped digital transformation The development of technological solutions to enrich and aid the lives of those giving and receiving care across the industry is a continuously dynamic process. Where ideas and designs may have been in the pipeline, 2020 saw providers accelerate the adoption of their roadmaps to combat the new challenges brought on by the pandemic. For WiFi SPARK, this meant working with existing customers in the NHS and care home sector to understand the growing pain points and look at how its technology could work to alleviate stress, feelings of isolation and aid in the management of care. The company’s roadmap saw its star solution, SPARK® Media, evolving to encapsulate digital care service integration across a number of years. Its premiere in late 2019 focused on patient entertainment, providing access to television, radio, streaming services, games and a digitised library of magazines and newspapers available via the on-site WiFi and accessible on user’s own devices. More than just entertainment Increasing hospital admissions meant that sites that carried the solution were able to provide their patients with free entertainment opportunities to keep them engaged as wait times increased and staff capacity was stretched. But as […]

Safe Touch

17 February 2022

The Value of Antimicrobial Touch-Points

Who is Safe Touch? Safe Touch Global has two key focus areas: Increasing peoples safety from viruses and germs Reducing the cost of constant cleaning time and product Safe Touch Global is the UK distributor of the leading antimicrobial touchpoint provider, Veraco. Antimicrobial products have been increasingly expanding around us to help protect us from viruses and germs, especially since the pandemic of Covid-19. We all protect ourselves with PPE, however, we are all more dependent on one another when it comes to the points we all touch on a regular basis. We can and should wash our hands regularly and thoroughly and depend on others to do the same but we know that door handles, rails and buttons can be touched every minute. It is not feasible to be cleaning every touch-point every minute as it would be hugely time consuming and costly. Since the pandemic, cleaning times and products have increased hugely to help protect staff, residents, visitors etc. It has been imperative to be responsible for those around us but it has come at a cost. With Safe Touch products for all your touch-points, you need only clean those touch-points once a day with warm water and yet […]

PCS

17 February 2022

The Benefits of Shared Care Records

S.A.F.E. is designed to help consumers make informed decisions about the most suitable location for their loved ones. It is built on a principle that there should be a way to enable anyone to know about a care provider’s services, to ensure the services are suitable and appropriate for the individual’s needs. Going back to the previous century, there was far less openness about what happened behind the closed doors of a care home. Even in a hospital, the matron would sometimes rule the roost with a rod of iron, and everyone accepted this situation. This willingness to accept what we are given, largely, no longer exists in this country; we have had the opportunity to make choices and we like to believe we are making informed choices based on our own needs. However, to make informed choices requires information, and this information needs to be in a consumable format and available where people need to see it. The challenge is, how to make information available without making the process of collecting and collating the information onerous. Reusing available information Care providers have no shortage of demands on their time, asking them to manually maintain another data source, purely for […]

Sherpa

Sherpa

21 February 2022

What are home visits and why do they matter?

Still a relatively new idea here in the UK, home visits have huge potential to boost a retirement living operator’s sales strategy. Home visits and other person-centred activities can help you address resistance and turn what feels like a rejection into an opportunity for change. The relationship isn’t over when you hear the commonly uttered phrase, ‘I’m not ready yet.’ There’s more to be learned, especially in terms of the very real emotions and objections surrounding the sale. The value of home visits We know that home visits can be time-consuming and expensive – there’s travel and you probably won’t want to show up empty-handed. They can also be highly intensive and a lot of responsibility for a salesperson, especially with COVID safety considerations. And at the end of the day, it can be awkward to ask to visit someone in their home. What if they say no? It’s encouraging to remember what we are trying to achieve, both for ourselves and the prospective resident who needs help. Rather than persuade, we are trying to facilitate understanding and help a prospect make a decision themselves. Our role as a sales advisor is to guide them through all aspects of the […]

WiFi Spark

WiFi Spark

12 April 2022

Creating a culture of IPC compliance that works for you

IPC compliance refers to the adherence to infection control measures put in place to cope with an outbreak of the coronavirus in healthcare-centric workplaces. The importance of robust infection control is key to a strong sector recovery from the pandemic and as the IPC compliance assessment tool notes, “it is integral to the control of any Covid-19 outbreak, or to prevent it from having a direct impact on your service”. But whilst workplaces are able to tackle IPC compliance through aids such as the tool, individual noncompliance and creating a supportive environment for reporting noncompliance is an altogether different issue. Staff can often find it difficult to speak out against defiance even amongst close peers because of fears of ramifications affecting their standing or workplace environment. But by creating a supportive atmosphere where everyone is empowered to speak up and feedback is rewarded, we are able to ensure that each and every member of the team becomes an IPC compliance advocate. The consideration of anonymous feedback is also crucial to encourage people to speak up. Where has generating a supportive environment been successful? Within the healthcare sector, we don’t need to look much further than Leeds and York Partnership NHS […]

Safe Touch

Safe Touch

12 April 2022

Protecting More, Costing Less

Being in control of protecting all against germs and viruses Setting standards of quality for the safety of staff, residents and visitors across your Care Homes is pivotal and a responsibility however ensuring this is done in the most efficient and cost effective way can be challenging which is where Safe Touch really allows that much needed layer of additional protection on all touch-points. All of the Safe Touch Veraco products are utilised across the NHS and have become a preferred and approved supplier of Antimicrobial touchpoints. To become an approved supplier of the NHS allows confidence due to the ongoing testing of the products to ensure they continue to offer significant ongoing protection. Please see just a few images of a small amount of the products in use. Installation All of the products are easy to install. They are designed to be fitted too hard, smooth surfaces such as plastic, metal, glass, wood etc and they can be removed with no residue. The self adhesive backing is engineered to provide the strength required to ensure the longevity of each product. Cleaning and Maintenance Our products are compatible with any cleaning protocols and resistant to most chemical agents, alcohol, diluted acids, etc The […]

Sherpa

Sherpa

30 May 2022

3 Activities to Increase Occupancy

3 Activities to Increase Occupancy in Retirement Living Sales-enablement platform Sherpa studied customer data from more than 100,000 senior living units across the United States to uncover the behaviours of top performing sales teams during 2021. Sherpa identified “Best Sales Performer” sales teams that achieved higher move-in ratios than the average. Three key activities where Best Sales Performers prioritise their selling time are: Home visits Creative follow-up Planning sessions These sales behaviours are an integral part of Sherpa’s “Prospect-Centred Selling” methodology. Best Sales Performers engaged consistently in these three activities and allocated more selling time in these areas than did the median performers. As a result, they had up to 2.4 times the number of sales across care types, including independent and assisted living. Here is a look at how top senior housing sales teams can sell more effectively. Home visits Some of the most valuable data to a team looking to increase occupancy is tracking how sales advisors spend their selling time. According to Sherpa’s 2021 Best Sales Performers Report, many sales teams underestimate the time and effort they’ll need to reach their occupancy goals. They also tend to overspend on marketing in order to generate more ‘fresh’ enquiries. […]

Safe Touch

Safe Touch

30 May 2022

24/7 365 Infection Prevention Control

Breaking the chain of spreading viruses and germs through all touch-points Safe Touch Global supply unique and innovative antimicrobial surface protection solutions to the CareHome & Retirement Living sector. Installing Safe Touch surface protection solutions throughout your CareHome or Retirement Living accommodations, ensures all your residents, visitors and staff are protected 24/7, 365 days of the year against a wide range of harmful pathogens. We provide a range of packages to suit your requirements including monthly subscriptions and bespoke branded products. Safe Touch being a sponsor of SAFE allows us to offer not only cost effective monthly packages to suit each Care Home or Retirement Living space but reduces the cost of cleaning times and products. We are only too aware that care providers are striving for: complete control over any infectious diseases entering their care setting. We provide a unique product and service to the care setting sectors by specialising in antimicrobial surface protection solutions to prevent the spread of germs and viruses but more importantly, break that chain of transmission via the most common spread of germs and viruses being touch-points from door handles to hand rails to light switches etc. Helping promote IPC and well-being in Care settings […]