The complaints of which the Commission is aware were made in a variety of formats.In a minority of cases, written complaints were made to the matron or the proprietor.However, most of the complaints were made orally. In some cases, the complainantssought out the matron to lodge their complaints at managerial level. In other cases,complaints were made to nurses or care workers and it is impossible to know for certain whether those complaints were passed on to the matron or the proprietor. For all these reasons, and in the absence of a comprehensive written record of complaintsto the home, it is impossible to state with any accuracy how many complaints weremade during the seven years Leas Cross was in operation.
Complaints in writing
The documents disclosed to the Commission by the owners of Leas Cross NursingHome contain two letters of complaint written by the families of residents in 2004.The first, dated the 8
th
January 2004, is addressed to the matron, Grainne Conway andconcerns the removal of sweets and biscuits from a resident’s locker, and the apparentdisappearance of clothes belonging to the resident. It is not clear whether this letter received a response.The second letter, dated the 11
th
November 2004, is addressed to Mr John Aherne,and contains a complaint about the designated smoking room for residents at thehome, which the author of the letter considered to be poorly situated and badlyventilated. A handwritten note on the face of the letter indicates that Mr Ahernetelephoned the author of the letter on the 17
th
November and informed him that LeasCross was
“looking into the situation”
.From information provided by the families of residents, the Commission is aware of afurther five written complaints to Leas Cross made while the residents in questionwere in the home and prior to the Prime Time documentary. Only one of those lettersyielded a substantive written response, while another resulted in a meeting with the proprietor at which the complaint was resolved. The letters are not amongst thedocuments disclosed to the Commission by the owners of Leas Cross Nursing Home.The substance of these letters is summarised below, according to the resident to whomthey relate.Kathleen R e illyMs Reilly, who suffered from Alzheimer’s disease, was admitted to Leas Cross inJuly 1999. In September 2000, members of her family found her wandering aroundthe area in Swords where she used to live. On the 6
th
September her niece wrote aletter of complaint to the owner of Leas Cross in relation to the incident.The letter of complaint was replied to by the matron Grainne Conway on the 11
th
September. The matron expressed regret on behalf of the nursing home for theincident and explained that that the transport section of the Eastern Health Board hadsent a taxi instead of an ambulance to take Ms Reilly to Beaumont, and asked the taxidriver to bring her to the x-ray department. They informed him that her details were inan envelope in the resident’s pocket. When Ms Reilly left Beaumont, she was brought114
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