Laois disability centre gets clean bill of health from HIQA

A HSE centre for people with disabilities was given a clean bill of health following an unannounced HIQA inspection in March.

The Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) published 24 inspection reports on designated centres for people with disabilities this week. 

Of these 24 inspections, inspectors found a good level of compliance with the regulations and standards in 14 centres. These included the HSE Portlaoise Area 1 facility which had seven residents at the time of the inspection. 

The HIQA inspector said: “Overall, the inspector found that this centre operated in a manner that was considerate of residents' assessed needs, capacities and individual preferences.” 

It stated that “many of the residents living in this centre had complex health care needs and required daily support with regards to their nutritional care, manual handling needs and respiratory care. Staff were very aware of the changing needs of some residents and ensured that these were well-communicated, where changes to residents' health care status were identified.” 

The inspection report stated that “as well as daily staff handover, the person in charge also contacted the centre each day to speak with nursing staff to get an update on the residents and on their overall well-being. This had a positive impact for these residents as it ensured timely response, should a review of their health care interventions be required. These residents had access to a wide variety of allied health care professionals, whom staff liaised with regularly to review resident specific health care interventions.” 

The full report can be found on HIQA’s webiste at  www.hiqa.ie