Residential disability services to face inspections

ALL residential services for people with disabilities will be inspected against a new set of national quality standards to be finalised by the tate’s health services watchdog later this year.

New draft standards published yesterday by the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) set out what a quality, safe service for people with physical and intellectual disabilities in residential services should be.

HIQA has now begun a consultation process and information collected will be used to develop a final set of standards later this year.

When the standards are finalised regulations will be drafted by the Department of Health and Children to give statutory effect to them.

All centres, both public and private, providing residential services will be inspected against the new standards that will form part of a new registration process.

HIQA, however, said it would be at least a year before centres will be inspected against the standards.

The authority’s chief social services inspector Dr Marion Witton, said their overall aim in creating the draft standards was to promote good, safe practice.

“We hope they will encourage the continuous quality improvement of residential services for people with disabilities in the coming years,” she said.

The standards outline what is expected of a provider of services and what a service user, their family and the public can expect to receive in residential care settings.

“I firmly believe they will contribute towards allowing people with disabilities to live in a safe, caring and respectful environment,” she said.

The proposed standards are grouped under seven headings that address issues such as quality of life, staffing, protection, development and health, rights, the physical environment and governance and management.

Dr Witton said the draft standards did not come out of an office — service users, their families, representative groups and those involved in providing residential services all had their say in how they should be drawn up by the authority. The authority has issued a wider invitation to the public, residents, staff and other interested parties to submit their views on the draft standards on or before Friday, October 31.

Written submissions can be made to Residential Care Standards Feedback, Health Information and Quality Authority, Social Services Inspectorate, Morrisson Chamber, 32 Nassau Street, Dublin 2. Submissions can also be emailed to: [e-mail]