The BGS is one of many organisations who support the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) in their commitment to improve quality standards for mental wellbeing of older people in care homes.
NICE has published a new quality standard to help care homes tackle loneliness, depression and low self-esteem in older people. Also available is the NICE Pathway for mental wellbeing and older people overview, which sets out the guidance and resources in a simple format.
Recommendations in the standard include that older people in care homes should be offered opportunities to participate in meaningful activities which promote health and mental wellbeing; that they should be supported to maintain and develop their personal identity and that they should have better access to NHS services.
The standard has been developed by an independent committee involving specialists in social care (including a care home representative and a director of adult social services) and public health as well as people with their own experience of the social care system.
The NICE Collaborating Centre for Social Care, hosted by SCIE, will be working with the sector to support adoption of the Quality Standard.
British Geriatrics Society 