The daughter of an 85-year-old woman who developed ‘horrific pressure sores’ whilst in a residential home say they’ve shared pictures of her injuries to highlight the continued poor treatment of the elderly – urging people to sign a petition calling for CCTV to be installed in all care homes.
Freda Jobson, who suffers from dementia, developed pressure sores on her lower back, hips and feet whilst a resident at the Keldgate Manor Residential Care Home in Beverley, East Yorkshire.
The sores have been described as ‘some of the worst seen’ by Lauren Dale, a medical negligence solicitor at Hudgell Solicitors, who is now representing the family.
Pictures of the sores, which form part of a compensation claim, have been released by the family in a bid to raise awareness about the poor care of the elderly.
They are also urging people to sign a national petition campaign calling for CCTV to be made compulsory in all UK care and residential homes.
Mrs Jobson was a resident at Keldgate Manor Residential Care Home from July 2012 until March 2015, when her family caught members of staff mocking and taunting her on a secret camera they placed in her room.
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Court action has seen those carers sentenced for ill-treatment, and now the family are launching legal action over the sores she suffered. Her daughter Maddy, 51, who today appeared on ITV’s This Morning to tell her story with Mrs Jobson’s granddaughter Hayley, said:
Initially, I didn’t intend to release these pictures, as they are very distressing and upsetting, but we’ve come to the point now, after all we have been through and continue to go through, where we want people to know how my mother suffered when at this home.
We strongly believe CCTV should be installed in all care and residential homes now. My mother was abused by staff who taunted her. We then discovered she had been allowed to develop these horrific injuries whilst in their care.
We need cameras now to stop abuse and neglect in care homes and to ensure those looking after the elderly are aware their actions will be filmed. Hopefully, by releasing these images, other families will also be more aware of how bad pressure sores can become when elderly and vulnerable people are not cared for properly.
There is no excuse for it, but all we have heard so far from the home is that they were not responsible for the medical care of my mother.
How on earth can they have allowed her to reach this level of sores and pain without referring her to hospital? We just thought that the time had come to make the people responsible for looking after my mother face serious questions, and the scrutiny of others.
Whilst in the home, Mrs Jobson suffered sores on her right hip and right buttock which measured 6cm x 3cm with a depth down to the bone, with ‘extensive underlying tissue damage and destruction.’
These have been classed by an independent medical expert as being the worst level ‘Grade 4’ sores, which require immediate treatment and usually surgery to remove.
She also had Grade 4 sores to her toe and elbow, whilst her heel was in such a bad state it was considered ‘ungradable’, with around 85 per cent dead tissue.
Mrs Jobson was moved to Beverley Community Hospital last March following the family’s undercover work, which caught staff mocking and laughing at her. Maddy says the transformation in her mother since leaving Keldgate Manor has been amazing. She said:
She is a different person now and it is a joy to go and see her. I used to dread going to see her before as she had no life.
If we’d not put that camera in the care home when we did, I am convinced she would have died within weeks. She was miserable, afraid, in pain and not eating anything.
Beverley Community Hospital have been absolutely fabulous, I can’t speak highly enough of them.
It has been a huge relief to see her so well looked after. Her sores have healed fantastically, both on her back and on her heels, because she is being properly cared for and is eating the right food, which is mashed for her, and getting the right nutrients.
I still feel guilty for not acting quickly enough when she was at Keldgate. Hopefully people will see these sores and it will make them question the treatment of their relatives more, and think about taking action to call for better protection of the elderly.
Despite it being accepted medically that around 95 per cent of pressure sores can be avoided with appropriate care, they had developed despite Keldgate Manor having identified Mrs Jobson as being at high risk of developing sores as long ago as January 2013.
