Saturday 26th October saw over 500 of the very best in social care attended a glittering awards ceremony at The Midland Hotel, Manchester, for the finals of the Great North West Care Awards, where the category winners were announced.
The Great North West Care Awards are part of the Great British Care Awards, a series of 9 regional awards celebrating excellence across the care sector. The purpose of the awards is to promote best practice within both home care and care homes sectors, and pay tribute to those individuals who have demonstrated outstanding excellence within their field of work.
Sector support for the events includes Care England, The Department of Health, The National Care Forum, The Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) and the Alzheimer’s Society, as well as local authorities and other commercial organisations.
There are a range of categories available for nomination, which represent all areas of the care sector; whether it be older people or specialist services and from frontline staff such as care workers and care managers to people who have made an impact in other ways such as training.
Winners of the Great North West Care Awards will go through to the final at Birmingham’s ICC on 20th March 2020.
The winners of the Great North West Care Awards, together with the judge’s comments are detailed below:
Care Home Employer
Community Integrated Care
Community Integrated Care displayed how passionate they are about their staff team. They have put in place excellent support strategies around mental health wellbeing and mindfulness packages. All of these have shown to us how their workforce is at the centre of everything they do. Thoroughly deserved winners.
Home Care Employer
Right at Home South Cheshire
Valuing, rewarding and training staff are strongly embedded in the organisation. Person centred care is at the heart of this outstanding providers’ ethos.
Care Home Worker
Carol Bennett
Anchor Trust
Carol has a genuine caring nature. She has a good relationship with residents, offering reassurance and support always. Carol stated that she ‘gained 60 family members’ when she joined the home five years ago. She has acquired an emotional maturity in her role and is the go-to person for other members of the team.
Home Care Worker
Wendy Nadin
Home Instead Senior Care
Wendy is relatively new to the caring industry but has learned new skills to be able to support her clients. Wendy believes that caring is a feeling and not just about what you do. Working for Home Instead Senior Care has given Wendy the confidence and opportunities to be in a position of privilege in clients’ own homes. Wendy doesn’t feel that she is at work but feels that she’s visiting friends.
Care Home Newcomer
Ryan Walker
Walsingham Support
Ryan demonstrated a commitment to empowering people and promoting their independence. He is dedicated to ensuring people are supported in their own homes and have a good quality of life. We are confident that he will have a long and successful career in care.
Home Care Newcomer
Emma Cutting
Unique Home Care Services
A passionate and dedicated individual who puts the service users at the heart of everything. An asset to the sector. Wishing her well for her future career!
The Care Home Registered Manager
Louise Corris
Ashberry Healthcare Ltd
Louise’s passion for her residents and staff shone through during the interview. She said that one of the biggest joys of her life was working in this sector. We felt Louise didn’t appreciate the impact she has on people around her. A caring candidate with an infectious personality – congratulations!
The Home Care Registered Manager
Mike Jones
Westwood Homecare North West Ltd
Mike impressed the judges with his clear self-motivation and appetite for education and development. He stripped back the management jargon and was able to successfully demonstrate his own individual leadership style. He showed that he was focused and committed to educational and continual personal development and demonstrates what true managements and leadership is all about.
The Care Home Cook/Chef
Catering Team (Lesley House and Laura Torrers)
Anchor
The catering team at Sandstones provide an exceptional service to their residents; from a silver service, high tea and taster sessions to bake off and come dine with me events. The entire team are committed to promoting service users’ choices and supporting their health needs, particularly in relation to weight monitoring. They dedicate a lot of personal time to each and every service user.
The Dignity in Care Award
Gill Sinar
Bridgewater Homecare
Gill demonstrated she is an intrinsically caring lady who understood and valued dignity in the person-centred care she provided to her clients. Gill was passionate about treating people with respect regardless of their individualism and explained how she supported peers. Gill should be very proud of the role she is doing and how this is having a positive impact on the service.
The Dementia Carer Award
Carol Boden, Ann Brown and Joanne Mosely
Halton Borough Council
Carol, Ann and Joanne showed real passion for care. They strive to always bring the best out in the people they care for and improve their quality of life. They all share their homes and lives with the people they care for and make them part of the family.
The Care Home Team Award
Cedar House
Belong Limited
The Team demonstrated the most personalised and individualised approach to ensuring someone’s happiness and safety. Various examples of going above and beyond, including a story of Sarah staying with a gentleman at hospital while he passed away. Good leadership and development.
The Home Care Team Award
Support Living
Walsingham Support
A team with passion to advocate for and support their service users. They have an innovative use of assisted technology. Shared care means that additional care can be carried over and used in lieu. The team put the clear best interests of the clients at centre of everything.
The Care Home Activity Organiser
Leona Millar
Pennine Lodge Care Home
Leona had been able to grant a resident’s last wish; to have one last Christmas with her family. Leona bought Christmas to the resident and the family so that they could all share one last Christmas together. Truly magical.
The Ancillary Worker Award
Neil O’Toole
Making Space
More than just a maintenance man! Neil has a flexible, calm approach and is multi-faceted in his skills. He is a great people person who will always involve residents in his work where possible and always goes above and beyond
The Workforce Development Award
Richard Callow
Barchester
Richard came across as extremely passionate about all his learners. We could really see the vision he had to take the learning and development forward within the teams he looks after.
The Care Innovator Award
John Hughes
Community Integrated Care
John has been the driving force in creating a super league of 12 rugby teams for adults with learning disabilities and autism. There are 250 players involved, only ten of whom has previously played sport. Players have learnt how to function in a team environment and are able to enjoy the same match day experience as their professional counterparts which culminated in a tournament at Anfield Stadium in front of 60,000 fans. This has shown the art of the possible and provided benefits for the service users, staff and local communities.
The Care Home Frontline Leader Award
Leah Wharton
Zeno Ltd
Leah has done an excellent job in improving the lives of her residents through increasing activities. She leads and motivates staff by example and uses innovative ideas to support staff and residents. She enjoys making a different and getting the best out of every day.
The Home Care Frontline Leader Award
Michelle Woodcock
Caretech Community Services
Michelle leads by example, motivating her team to deliver quality person centred care. Passionate and committed – inspirational!
The Home Care Coordinator Award
Sue Wilson
Westmorland Homecare
Sue is passionate, enthusiastic and above all cares. This was demonstrated by robustness of answers and detail. She made an active contribution to an outstanding CQC rating and is clearly dedicated to improving quality outcomes of clients.
The Putting People First/Personalisation Award
Brooklands Care Home
Brooklands support some of the most complex people and everything is their choice. Although the majority of people do not communication by speech this doesn’t impact choice. For example when shopping for toiletries, people choose their own from smell and feel. Families give insight to previous life and one example was a dream of being a pilot for someone who has locked in syndrome. The company arranged for the service user to visit a hanger. So much passion and choice offered to the most vulnerable people!
The Palliative Care/End of Life Award
Jane Lyth
Marey Court Nursing Home, Millenium Care
Jane has demonstrated that she is committed in providing a person centred approach to end of life care. She can show empathy and support to individuals, circles of support and the staff team. Jane should be proud of her work she carries out in times of end of life.
The Good Nurse Award
Wendy Ryan-Brockman
Birkdale Park Nursing Home
Although Wendy is relatively new to nursing, this vocation has been a lifelong calling. Wendy has made personal sacrifices to pursue a career in nursing. She is keen to develop her skills further and has already several recognised qualifications and achievements, self-teaching and sharing these learnings with her team. Wendy really does go above and beyond.
The Housing with Care Award
Penrhyn Team
Accomplish Care
Jamie demonstrated a broad knowledge of housing with care. He is clearly involved in day to day care whilst being an active leader also. He gave some outstanding examples of how input from his team has led to more independent living, from a near placement failure to a holiday in Portugal. Excellent team and leadership.
The Care Assessor Award
Catherine Plimley
Wrexham Learning Disability Team
Catherine clearly is very passionate in her role. She really cares about each individual and getting the best care for their needs and for their own wishes. Catherine clearly has a keen eye for detail noticing one client had been emotionally abused. With Catherine’s careful and strategic intervention alongside other healthcare professionals, this individual is now in safe and a happy environment. Catherine should be really proud!
Unpaid Carer
Michael Worswick
Birkdale Park Nursing Home
Michael has been an unpaid carer and volunteer at Birkdale Park for the last 10 years. Michael has learning disabilities and is an effective member of the Birkdale Park team working closely with the on-site maintenance team. He is nothing less than exceptional, assisting the care home owner Reginald with routine tasks including maintenance, painting, shopping and general errands. He cycles everywhere and will happily cycle to collect bread, a new tap or spare blub from the shops across the town.
More recently, following the sudden death of Reginald, such news was devastating for the care home. Nevertheless, Michael stepped forward to ensure all the maintenance tasks continued to be delivered regardless of this huge void within the home. In addition, the situation was compounded with the sudden resignation of our Head of Maintenance. The timing could not have been worse.
Once again Michael was undaunted and stepped into the breach, immediately delivering an exceptional maintenance service to Birkdale Park. This included fixing profiling beds, painting, decorating, conducting minor electrical works and even ensuring sinks and toilets were unblocked.
Ironically, he had never been permitted to attempt such tasks on his own in the past but his combination of autism and learning disabilities meant he had remembered everything he had ever watched!
The care home was dumfounded with the high quality of his work, frequently saving the day and a growing list of tasks achieved! He is a truly exceptional individual that went way beyond anyone’s volunteering expectations.
He is very much the heart and soul of Birkdale Park and considering his learning disability, profound dyslexia and autism he has demonstrated that everyone in life has a calling. Michael is nothing less than exceptional and we thank him for his loyal volunteering.
Outstanding Contribution
Carrie Browne, District Manager, Anchor
In the words of the team who nominated Carrie:
Carrie is a District Manager at Anchor of eight homes.
She motivates her team sharing her vision, passion and goals. Carrie organises regular events withing the district for both staff and residents to bring everyone together and promote friendships.
Carrie is a strong leader is always hands-on. She supports home managers and develops them to deliver the highest quality care. All homes in her district have been rated Good, two homes with Outstanding and one recent inspection with a predicted Outstanding.
The passion for her work is commendable, and she is often called upon to go out of district to support other district manager to improve their services, sharing her skills and knowledge.
She never fails to improve homes from required improvements, she works relentlessly round the clock and is always at the end of the phone when support is required. She gets very little credit for the outstanding work she does, but we feel she is very deserving of an award.
Lets celebrate social care and help it get the recognition it deserves