My 84 year old father is in a specialist dementia care home. He moved in last October after he was found wandering the streets and his dementia has rapidly developed since he moved in (which we had expected).
However lately he is refusing to let the carers shower him or change his nappies (apparently he gets angry when they try). He is very calm and gentle at all other times.
There have now been several occasions over the last couple of months where he has been left in the same soiled nappy for several days, which has resulted in infections. Yesterday we visited and found him extremely agitated with several days worth of hardened faeces stuck and blocking his passage (apologies for the graphic description) which took my poor brother a long time to remove for him. The carers simply said they can't force a nappy change on him, so they just leave him, and if his behaviour continues this way they may insist he moves out.
I find this utterly disgraceful! I understand their difficulties, but doing nothing and leaving him to fester in his own filth is not an option - surely this is neglect?
We have told them before that they should either call one of us, call a doctor, or both, if they're struggling with him. Give us the opportunity to do something about it, rather than give up and leave him. We only find out about any problems when we visit and we're left having to shower and clean him up.
Now we're very worried about his care. He is self funded and the care home isn't cheap - we thought he was paying for the best care in a specialist unit used to dealing with this sort of thing.
Has anyone been through a similar situation and what did you do?
Any advice on what steps we should take?
However lately he is refusing to let the carers shower him or change his nappies (apparently he gets angry when they try). He is very calm and gentle at all other times.
There have now been several occasions over the last couple of months where he has been left in the same soiled nappy for several days, which has resulted in infections. Yesterday we visited and found him extremely agitated with several days worth of hardened faeces stuck and blocking his passage (apologies for the graphic description) which took my poor brother a long time to remove for him. The carers simply said they can't force a nappy change on him, so they just leave him, and if his behaviour continues this way they may insist he moves out.
I find this utterly disgraceful! I understand their difficulties, but doing nothing and leaving him to fester in his own filth is not an option - surely this is neglect?
We have told them before that they should either call one of us, call a doctor, or both, if they're struggling with him. Give us the opportunity to do something about it, rather than give up and leave him. We only find out about any problems when we visit and we're left having to shower and clean him up.
Now we're very worried about his care. He is self funded and the care home isn't cheap - we thought he was paying for the best care in a specialist unit used to dealing with this sort of thing.
Has anyone been through a similar situation and what did you do?
Any advice on what steps we should take?