Euan McGrory: Another alarm call in the care crisis

The results of the latest care inspection at Springfield Bank Nursing Home make for disturbing reading.

Springfield Bank Care Home, Bonnyrigg

The ways in which residents have been neglected must make for harrowing reading for anyone with loved ones living in the Bonnyrigg complex. The poor, overstretched staff were clearly unable to provide even the most basic care and support to those who were entitled to expect much, much more.

I say ‘poor’ staff advisedly. Close reading of the report reveals that often there were either not enough staff on duty or those that were had not been trained properly or quite possibly on occasions both. The staff might not have suffered in the same extreme way the residents have done, but they have been badly let down as well.

Regular readers of this newspaper will be only too well aware that, extreme as they might be, the problems facing Springield Bank are far from unique. The checks and balances which normally stop such problems spiralling into crisis clearly failed completely in this case. There is some reassurance in these failings being spotted and decisively dealt with by the Care Inspectorate, but this is also another reminder of the pressures on care in modern Scotland.