Decision Report 201406227

Summary

Mrs C complained about the care and treatment provided to a resident (Mr A) of the care home she managed when he was admitted to Glasgow Western Infirmary to have a catheter fitted. Mr A had dementia. Medical staff had to make a number of attempts to fit the catheter, which distressed Mr A. Mrs C said that staff failed to provide adequate care when they attempted to insert a catheter and properly manage his pain. She also said that staff failed to provide Mr A with adequate sustenance and communicate with his carer as they should have done.

We took independent advice from a nursing adviser. We found that the board failed to provide Mr A with adequate sustenance or communicate with his carer as they should have done, particularly given Mr A's dementia. However, we found no evidence that the placement of a catheter was unreasonable (although we appreciated how distressing an experience this was for Mr A) or that staff had failed to manage his pain.

Recommendations

We recommended that the board:

• consider and report on steps taken to address the failings we identified;
• bring the nursing adviser's comments about communication to the attention of relevant staff; and
• apologise for the failures we identified.