Any care facility should promote older adult mental health. This ranges from treating every resident with dignity to guaranteeing the support they need and empowering them to be involved with their lifestyle decisions.
Let’s look at the importance of promoting mental health in older people, what the situation is like in care homes, and what steps you can take in your facility.
Elderly Mental Health
As found in the Older People and Wellbeing report by the Institute for Public Policy Research, many challenges that the elderly go through can affect their mental health.
Some of them feel lonely and depressed, which leads to living the rest of their life with low levels of both satisfaction and wellbeing.
On top of that, around 15% of over 60s suffer from at least one mental disorder.
The Current Situation of Older Adult Mental Health in Care Facilities
In its Mental Wellbeing of Older People in Care Homes report, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence has found that these elderly mental health problems are particularly widespread in care homes.
The main reasons seem to be a lack of person-centred care, not a wide enough range of activities, limited access to healthcare services, and poor mental health plans.
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How to Improve Resident Health in Care Homes
We recommend following the six points raised in the NICE report and providing adequate training to all your staff members.
1. Participation in Meaningful Activities
Your staff should encourage residents to take part in both spontaneous and planned activities that help maintain or improve their mental health.
If possible and requested, family members, friends, or carers should also be involved to develop meaningful relationships.
Your residents’ feedback is key when it comes to planning these activities, ensuring that your facility offers a satisfying range to cater for different preferences.
2. Encouragement to Maintain and Develop their Personal Identity
Your carers should always be aware of your residents’ personal history and interests, honouring them and taking them into account to treat them with dignity.
Furthermore, your residents should be actively encouraged to express themselves as individuals and to make their own decisions whenever capable of doing so.
This also involves tailoring your facility’s opportunities to their unique needs and preferences.
Your residents’ feedback is key when it comes to planning these activities, ensuring that your facility offers a satisfying range to cater for different preferences.
3. Awereness and Recognition of Resident’s Mental Health Conditions
As well as promoting older adult mental health, your care home must identify existing conditions. Sadly, they often go unrecognised and, consequently, untreated.
This starts with a thorough initial assessment but doesn’t end with the creation of their care plan.
In fact, your staff must be trained to recognise and record early symptoms of mental health conditions.
4. Awareness and Recognition of Sensory Impairments
Another factor that can affect older adult mental health is the existence or appearance of sensory impairments such as sight or hearing loss.
While they are extremely common in the elderly, they often go unnoticed and undiagnosed for too long in care homes.
These impairments can affect a resident’s communication skills, confidence, and independence, consequently causing isolation and impacting their mental health negatively.
This also involves tailoring your facility’s opportunities to their unique needs and preferences.
Your residents’ feedback is key when it comes to planning these activities, ensuring that your facility offers a satisfying range to cater for different preferences.
5. Awareness and Recognition of Physical Problems
A similar pattern can be found when it comes to physical conditions like incontinence, constipation, urinary tract infections, or undiagnosed pain.
Not only do these problems cause discomfort and pose risks, but they can severely affect your residents’ abilities to participate in social activities or to feel independent.
Once again, this will negatively affect their mental health.
Your staff should always conduct a thorough initial assessment and be trained to recognise signs and symptoms of arising problems, knowing how to act.
6. Guaranteed Acess to Relevant Healthcare Services
Being able to recognise the previous problems early on is vital. However, if your employees don’t know what next steps to take, your residents will still feel isolated and neglected.
They should be able to be referred to and access primary, secondary, specialist, and mental health services whenever required.
7. Training Your Staff to Deal with Older Adult Mental Health
To promote mental health in older people in your care home, your staff must be aware of its importance and know exactly how to react.
At Learn 2 Excel, we offer an online Mental Health Awareness course that will facilitate training in your facility as it can be followed by your staff members individually and at their own pace.
Our CPD-accredited course covers:
- An understanding of mental health
- Learning how to spot mental health disorders
- How to make the right referrals
- Supporting residents suffering from mental health disorders
- Avoiding discrimination and stigma
- Treating these disorders and dealing with the side effects of medications
We also offer an at-home training course that introduces employees to the Mental Capacity Act and Deprivation of Liberties, to deliver more a more rounded knowledgebase.
Give your residents the best possible experience by promoting older adult mental health in your facility. Start training your staff and putting the NICE guidelines into practice.
