Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 27 November 2018
420. Deputy Fergus O'Dowd asked the Minister for Health further to Parliamentary Question No. 644 of 6 November 2018, if a reply will issue outlining an independent appeals process as requested but not responded to in the reply received from the HSE. [49252/18]
View answerIn relation to the reviews and/or appeals in relation to restrictions in place, in the first instance a complaint should be made through the residential service's internal complaints process. All residential care homes must have processes and procedures in place for dealing with complaints. The person in charge of the home can provide assistance on how to make a complaint.
Complaints on issues may also be made to the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) as the statutory independent regulator for the nursing home sector and this responsibility is underpinned by a comprehensive quality framework comprising of Registration Regulations, Care and Welfare Regulations and National Quality Standards. As a regulator HIQA has no formal legal role in examining individual complaints. However, the Authority does take into account all information it receives, including complaints from the public, when carrying out inspections.
The Office of the Ombudsman, as an independent body, can examine complaints about the actions of a range of public bodies and, from 24 August 2015, complaints relating to the administrative actions of private nursing homes. The Office of the Ombudsman normally only deals with a complaint once the individual has already gone through the complaints procedure of the private nursing home concerned.
As such, there is already a well-established complaints/review process including, where required, an independent body which can consider any related issues. This is the appropriate process for considering these matters. As noted previously a review of all instances of restrictions is underway in the HSE. There are 11 such cases across mental health and older people services. This is in the context of currently providing some 7,000 beds across those services.
