Nursing home checks delayed until next year

INDEPENDENT inspections of nursing homes nationwide are set to be delayed until late 2008 at the earliest, a conference on elder abuse heard yesterday.

The head inspector with the state’s new health standards watchdog admitted insufficient staff numbers meant it would be late summer next year before residential centres for the elderly were checked.

Chief inspector Michele Clarke, with the newly established Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA), said complaints in the meantime were being referred back to the Health Service Executive.