Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council: my home life

Dedicated training for staff in Care Homes, residential and nursing, to promote and embed improved End of Life Care. This case study forms part of our end of life care guide for councils.

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Key points

  • A skilled workforce in care homes helps reduce emergency attendances from care homes and a decrease in numbers of people dying in hospitals.
  • To work with both residential and nursing homes is important as people need skilled, confident end of life care in both settings.

Case study

My Home Life is an international initiative promoting quality of life for older people living and dying in care homes, and for those visiting and working with them, through relationship-centred and evidence-based practice. It is led, in England, by City University in partnership with Age UK.

The project is aimed at educating and building the confidence of nursing and care home staff to enable them to deliver effective harm free and end of life care to reduce the number of deaths in hospital and increase the number of deaths in a preferred place. Twenty-four care home managers and owners were supported through the programme, which commenced in October 2017 and completed in September 2018. After evaluating the first phase of the project, it was decided that the programme needed to be adapted and changed to expand the offer to residential homes as well as nursing.

The impact was over a small cohort statistically, but there was a reduction in 2018/19 of emergency attendances from care homes and a decrease of people from care homes dying Hospital. Feedback from care home staff on the training was very positive. 

The programme continues and has been expanded to cover more care homes.