Navigating Involuntary Care Home Closures: Professional Perspectives and Thematic Analysis of Failures in Norfolk

The Care Quality Commission is responsible for regulating care homes across England to make sure that residents are respected and provided for. But what happens when they find a home who are not doing this?

Little is known about commonalities in the main failings that preclude a care home’s closure after the Care Quality Commission’s intervention, and little is known concerning the effects of closing down a home on healthcare professionals.

To understand the common themes precluding care home closure and whether debriefing can aid healthcare professionals in dealing with the emotional challenges of care home closure. This study used thematic analysis to investigate commonalities in themes between 10 care homes in Norfolk which have been involuntarily closed by the Care Quality Commission.

This study also used focus groups to investigate the challenges of closing a care home using a debriefed participant cohort and a non-debriefed cohort. This study found that all care homes in the timeframe of data collection that had been closed shared four major failings:

• Poor overall culture within the home
• Lack of support for staff and managers
• Unfit environment to provide good quality care; and
• Ineffective systems in place to provide good quality care

This study found that both debriefed and non-debriefed participants had similar experiences surrounding emotional challenges akin to secondary traumatic stress. However, the non-debriefed participants had more negative experiences thinking and dealing with care home closure workloads than those who had been debriefed.

There are four major themes of failure that precludes an involuntary care home closure. The findings also confirm that there may be some benefit to debriefings on how healthcare professionals cope with workloads of care home closure.