Summary: Mr C complains on behalf of his partner, Mr D in relation to his care and support at a care home funded by the Council. Mr C said that faults in medication, lost property and staff attitude led to Mr D’s deterioration and distress for Mr C. We will not investigate this complaint as the care home has admitted fault and taken action to prevent it happening again.

The complaint

1. Mr C complains about his partner, Mr D’s care by a care home (the Home) funded by Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council. Specifically he complains about:

• Medication management – Ensure.
• Lack of care and understanding of Mr D’s eating habits and health situation
• Lost property
• Attitude and aggressive behaviour towards Mr C

2. Mr C has said the impact of this was distress of being told Mr D was dying but then realising it was the Home not feeding him properly.
3. Mr C also finds it hard to trust anyone and Mr D’s life could have been lost.
4. As an outcome of his complaint Mr C would like:

• More respect for older people.
• Staff training to stop it happening again.

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The Ombudsmen’s role and powers

5. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe:

• it is unlikely we could add to any previous investigation by the organisation, or
• we cannot achieve the outcome someone wants.
  (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

6. I considered evidence provided by Mr C and the Home as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.

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What I found

Background

7. Mr D has dementia and some other health issues and was discharged from Hospital to the Home in 2025 after previously living at home. The aim was for him to recover from his hospital stay.
8. However, Mr D deteriorated and was admitted to hospital again several weeks later. He recovered again and returned to his home with Mr C helping to care for him.
9. Mr C complained that the Home was not helping Mr D to eat and drink and he lost weight. He also said that a medication that Mr D was taking, Ensure, which is a nutritional supplement, should have been given to him three times a day and this was not happening. e He raised this with staff at the Home after two weeks.
10. After Mr D left the Home, Mr C came to collect his belongings but said a lot of his clothes were missing. He returned and some of his clothes were there but not all of them. He requested reimbursement for the lost clothes.
11. Mr C also said staff were rude and aggressive with him when he tried to retrieve the clothes.
12. The Home said that Mr D had started to decline food and drink and carers could not force him to eat. The Home said it involved the local GP who said to monitor the situation but eventually he deteriorated which meant the GP recommended he be readmitted to hospital.
13. The Home said that the Ensure prescription was in Mr D’s records, and when it realised the medication had not come with him from the hospital, the Home should have requested and administered it before Mr C noticed some two weeks after Mr D first arrived at the Home.
14. The Home apologised for the mistake in relation to Ensure and put all of its staff on refresher training. This training was to make sure staff double check discharge documents from a resident’s hospital to identify any missing medication that has not come with them when they arrive at the Home. In addition, the Home Manager will be informed of any missing medication along with an incident report being added to the Home’s computer system.
15. Regarding the clothes, the Home said that it was sorry that clothes went missing and if Mr C could supply receipts then it would reimburse Mr D for items lost. When Mr C could not supply receipts it offered £150 to cover the losses. Mr C feels the loss is closer to £300.

Analysis

16. It appears regarding the Ensure that there was a fault which the Home admitted. The Home has taken appropriate action to prevent this happening again and this is also one of the outcomes which Mr C wants. Therefore an investigation would be unlikely to achieve more for Mr C.
17. Regarding the attitude of staff, without the Home admitting this was the case, we would not be able to prove that the staff were rude or aggressive to Mr C. In relation to the lost property, an investigation would be unlikely to uncover what items of Mr D were lost. Therefore, it would not be proportionate to investigate on this issue and the Home has offered £150 which we would be unlikely achieve more than.

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Decision

18. I find that we will not investigate this case as although there may have been fault on the part of the Home, it has taken appropriate action to prevent it happening again and we would be unlikely to recommend more if we investigated.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman