The Valleys Care Home

The Valleys always strives to give the best care possible to all its residents, so it is therefore very disappointing to read this review. We are very sorry that our resident’s son, James, was unhappy with the care that we gave his Mum whilst she was with us.

However, we do not recognise his description of the care given or indeed the attitude of the home. We feel the review is inaccurate on many levels and gives a completely false impression of what actually occurred in the home and of the treatment and care given to his mother during her stay with us.

We would like to take this opportunity to address specific points:
The reviewer states “My Mum was placed in The Valleys by the Council. Within a month she had lost a lot of weight and had deteriorated rapidly.”
Factually we can confirm that this resident’s weight did not decrease during their stay at the home. This resident came to reside at the care home as requested by the family, and 3 show arounds of the home were conducted prior to admission.
The reviewer states “Approximately one month after entering the care home she then had three falls in one day. She ended up in Hospital for many weeks and was eventually discharged into another care home.”
We can confirm the nature of the people we care for does mean they are at high risk of falls and all appropriate steps are taken to minimise risk and injury. We ensure that all external healthcare professionals are involved, and we can confirm that factually this was the case for this resident.
The hospital contacted the care home when this resident was ready for discharge and asked if she could return to The Valleys but stated that she now required a 1:1 care regime. The Valleys Care home is not able to facilitate 1:1 placements, and this is when an alternative care home was explored for this resident.
The reviewer states “She is now in a very bad way and will not recover. I requested an investigation into what happened and it is clear from the official safeguarding investigation report by the Council that my Mum was not kept adequately hydrated. The report states that my Mum was offered only 400ml of fluid on the days leading up to her falls. The target is 1500ml per day. The report states that there are inconsistencies in the amount of fluid offered to my Mum before her falls, with as little as 300ml being offered some days. The Valleys were asked for the reasons and simply ignored the request for information from the Council.”
A full internal investigation was carried out by the care home and shared with the local authority Safeguarding team with no further actions recommended by the Safeguarding Team on reviewing the report. The assertions by the reviewer are factually inaccurate.

We always welcome feedback; however, it is our opinion that this review is neither balanced nor factually accurate. We are always more than happy to discuss the care we give with any family and would be happy to do so in this case, if James would like to get back in touch with us.