MOH steps up surveillance of nursing homes
By Sara Grosse | Posted: 15 July 2011 1145 hrs
SINGAPORE: The Ministry of Health (MOH) has stepped up checks on nursing homes, following a report on alleged mistreatment at a home that was highlighted in June.
The immediate target is Nightingale Nursing Home, which was at the centre of a video showing two of its staff allegedly mistreating an elderly patient.
In it, two staff members were seen flinging an elderly woman onto the bed. One was seen slapping her on the mouth after she moaned in pain.
The video first surfaced on MediaCorp's Chinese news programme in June.
The home cannot take in new patients for the time being while investigations continue.
It now has to submit reports every month on its day-to-day operations, covering areas such as management checks, how staff and patients interact, as well as channels to keep patients' families in the loop.
As for commercial and government-subsidised nursing homes, there will be more inspections.
Health Minister Gan Kim Yong said: "The approach is a risk-management approach. We will also look at the different nursing homes and assess what's the risk level and we will tailor and design our inspection regime according to the risk profile of different nursing homes.
"We will visit some homes more frequently. And for some homes, we will be able to allow the management to continue their work and we just conduct regular inspections."
Geraldine Lim, nurse manager of Society for the Aged Sick (SAS), said: "I always encourage peer monitoring as well as my nurses supervising them.
"So more or less, they are not left alone to do things for the elderly. There's always another pair of eyes watching what they are doing.
"Even if MOH has to closely monitor us, I have no issue with that."
Mr Gan was speaking on the sidelines of a ground-breaking ceremony for the Society for the Aged Sick (SAS) on Friday.
He said his ministry is also exploring the possibility of monitoring operations at nursing homes through a network of volunteers.
SAS is building a nine-storey annexe wing to meet rising demand.
Construction of the annexe wing, which will have 160 beds, will be completed by 2013 and will cost some S$12 million. It will also have physiotherapy and rehabilitation facilities.
To meet demand for bed capacity, six new nursing homes are expected to be built over the next two to three years.
- CNA/fa/ck
MOH steps up surveillance of nursing homes
By Sara Grosse | Posted: 15 July 2011 1145 hrs
Extracted from Stomp : Foreigners shoo family away from Botanic Gardens landmarks because they "booked it"
Comments by one person I found require attention.
By SophiaRosieHart
1. if Foreigners weren't in singapore singapore would have heaps of poor people or heaps of people in jail
2. if we werent here singapore would of been run to the ground singapore cant live without Foreigners because they the ones who are bringing all the money in and they the ones who are building all your malls like if i wasn't here also mbs wouldn't be up and running like it is now
3. singaporeans race is mostly chinese and malay mixed
4.everyone is a Foreigner to singapore because singapore doesnt even have its own real race
5.my own real race is maori and english
and mbs is the only good looking building in singapore but crap inside sadly hahahaha i got here to late when it started flooding because these dumb *****s dont know anything about building
6.@Darn walk out on a job i get paid 30 grand a month for mate you must be joking,found a job like that in new zealand nope because they all taken and i would rather travel the world i've been to most of asia i must say singapore was the worse place i ever landed in and i cant wait in till i get to move
7.and u see i already have another job lined up thats mine if i want it and most of the new zealanders here get moved around by the same company they dont keep them here because they know they dont like it just like my boss knows i hate singapore thats why next is Bangkok or Dubai or Aussie.
he probably worked his ass of an lied to get the job thats why he cant move anywhere because he sucks and no one wants him ouch that must hurt hahahahahahahahahaa like no one wants you
I guess our Governement is not aware of all these. Keep talking about about "talent". The Government need to have a system to weed out such Foreigner.
Govt knows, but they ask us to take it as a self improvment feedbacks, "We should take feedbacks and comments as a learning process" Minister, Minster of State
Last time, many people told me that putting aged parents at the homes are sending them to gallows. Now I know why.