Catering

Supporting the elderly to eat and enjoy food together

Over the last few years, Food for Life has researched intergenerational activity and support for care settings for the elderly. Here, Florence Todd Fordham shares some of the findings

Malnutrition presents a significant health work in Edinburgh, Calderdale, Kirklees, threat to older people and care home Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland. residents. In the UK, over one-third of care The team used innovative techniques, home residents have been found to be based on ethnography and co-design, to malnourished and require treatment (BAPEN, identify opportunities for change. Food 2015). This has major impacts on their quality for Life Better Care sought to be both of life, with additional consequences such comprehensive – with a whole settings as social isolation and loneliness. Through approach to multiple aspects of food – and the Food for Life Better Care programme we developmental – to test out and reflect on have aimed to positively impact on the lives what worked and what might be enhanced. of older people and care home residents. While each area shared a common overarching framework and What is Food for Life approach towards engaging Better Care? partners, it was anticipated Food for Life Better Care was a two year programme to promote good food for older people and included a focus on care homes and intergenerational Overall, the Food for Life Better Care activities were linked to promising evidence of benefits for care home resident from the outset that the team would adapt the delivery of the intervention to fit local circumstances. The programme has consisted of

networking, training, support, development and delivery for a wide range of care homes.

This has included creating opportunities to partner with nurseries and schools, some of which are active in the Food for Life schools and Early Years national programmes. Food for Life Served Here, an accreditation from the Soil Association that awards sustainable and healthy catering, was used as a platform for promoting nutrition, hydration and sustainability standards in care homes. Key goals of the Food for Life Better Care programme were to prevent malnutrition and loneliness, to enhance the wellbeing of people in later life, to build capacity within the care sector around food, and to bring communities together through food.

FFLSH and sustainability of food provided A key aspect of Food for Life Better Care was supporting better access to nutritious food. Through our work in other settings, such as

schools and early years, Food for Life has a wealth of experience in improving the food provision, procurement of ingredients and the overall dining experience. To help caterers make good changes, Food for Life supports food providers to meet Food for Life Served Here criteria. Food for Life Served Here is an independent endorsement, backed by annual inspections, for food providers who are taking steps to improve the food they serve, for climate, nature and health. The aim of the scheme is to encourage and reward caterers who serve fresh food, source environmentally sustainable and ethical food, make healthy eating easy, and champion local food producers. Food for Life Served Here accreditation is available for all organisations who serve food. The fixed bronze standards apply to all caterers while silver and gold are assessed using a points-based system. Points are achieved at silver and gold for sourcing environmentally friendly and ethical food, steps taken towards making healthy eating easy and championing local food producers.

If you see a Food for Life Served Here logo you know that the majority of food on the menu will be freshly prepared, it will always be free from undesirable trans fats, sweeteners and additives, be cooked by trained chefs, and use ingredients from sustainable and ethical sources.

What did we find?

The evaluation of Food for Life Better Care was led by the University of the West of England, collaborating widely and building on related research to ensure relevance across the UK.

Through the evaluation we were ultimately testing a hypothesis: if older people have better access to nutritious food, therapeutic food activities and shared mealtimes across care homes, community care services and hospitals, will they be less susceptible to malnutrition and loneliness and enjoy enhanced health and well-being?

The programme introduced individuals and organisations to the methods and benefits of co-design and whole settings approaches. Greater collaboration helped move beyond the fragmented and isolating working practices that often feature in adult social care. The programme therefore illustrated an approach that holds the prospect of being transferable and scale-able. Overall, the Food for Life Better Care activities were linked to promising evidence of benefits for care home residents in terms of positive social interactions, mood and mental wellbeing, improved diet and enjoyment of meals and eating.

Case study

In November 2017, the Food for Life Better Care team collaborated with staff and residents at Summerfield House Care and Nursing Home, a large privatelyowned care home in Calderdale, to test a whole settings approach to food using a co-design test-and-learn approach.

Over an 18-month period, the Food for Life Better Care team collaborated with staff and residents at Summerfield House Care and Nursing Home to focus on food and food

If older people have better access to nutritious food, therapeutic food activities and shared mealtimes across care homes, will they be less susceptible to malnutrition and loneliness and enjoy enhanced health and well-being?

related activities as a social experience and a bridge to the surrounding community. Food for Life Better Care sought a comprehensive approach, in that the programme was informed by a whole settings approach to consider multiple aspects of food. The team adopted a ‘test and learn’ approach to the programme. This involved consulting with residents, care home staff and others on types of activities to run, testing them out, and reflecting upon the learning.

There were several benefits of the programme to residents, staff, residents’ relatives, schools and the care home itself. The analysis led by the University of West England showed that residents derived social, affective, nutritional and general wellbeing benefits from the programme. Staff who engaged in the programme were noted to feel valued, supported and developed a higher sense of morale in the care home. Communication between staff and residents were observed to have improved during the implementation of the programme. There were testimonies from staff about residents’ relatives’ satisfaction of care due to residents’ exposure and engagement in the Food for Life Better Care activities.

The activities had a positive impact on school pupils who visited Summerfield House Care and Nursing Home to undertake intergenerational growing, gardening and other food-related activities with residents. There were observed and reported increase in empathy for older people; counterstereotypical behaviour towards older people; and development of friendships with residents through the intergenerational work. The quality of food was noted to improve during implementation of the Food for Life Better Care programme in Summerfield House Care and Nursing Home and management had realised savings on food cost and reduction of plate waste.

The future of Food for Life Better Care

Because of the experience of successfully delivering Food for Life Better Care, we have learned that therapeutic food activities, dining room experiences and nutrition training activities are greatly beneficial to residents, care home staff and catering teams. This experience and the expertise we have built around improving the health and well-being of older people through food related activities, means we know how to support care homes to develop an outstanding food culture and service. L This article first appeared in Health Business magazine.

FURTHER INFORMATION

Can drones really help in the fight against COVID-19?

With a growing number of professional drone operators in the UK, can the government turn to this vital resource and deploy operators across the UK to support the fight, or is public perception of drones preventing integration?

Drones operations in the UK has grown rapidly in the last five years, with nearly 6,000 professional operators providing services from wedding photography to emergency services incident response. Our skies have always been an important part of our lives, from hobbyist remote controlled craft to manned aviation, it’s no surprise that with the current rate of growth in consumer and professional drone operators the general public are getting a little protective of this space.

In 2016, a poll by the Royal Aeronautical Society (RAS) found 91 per cent of respondents supporting the use of drones for emergency response and 83 per cent supporting police intelligence. That is compared to 81 per cent in favour of infrastructure inspection and 78 per cent for agricultural uses, and only 37 per cent supportive of drones being used for leisure activities.

The thought of drones flying over your building with a powerful camera attached is almost certainly going to cause concern, after all, we just don’t know who is at the controls and why they are there. Remember when council and enforcement agencies placed CCTV around your towns and Cities? We heard similar concerns then. Followed closely by education with fly-on-the-wall documentaries and CCTV backed convictions, came a new acceptance of CCTV. This is the answer to drones being accepted in our skies.

Drone uses - the right operator is key

Key sectors for drone integration include: insurance, construction, transport, public service, emergency services, agriculture and mining. Drone deliveries are at very early stages of trial and we are a long way from this becoming reality in the UK. All of these Sectors have integrated drones into their businesses, some greater than others and with varied results, this is often down to how the drone package has been presented, selected and implemented. Anyone can get a drone and deliver a service, right? Yes, they can, with the right training and CAA approval it takes little experience to get a drone in the air and click away the camera, will you get the image or data results required and the benefits of your investment? No.

Emergency services - drone integration examples

Police Forces across the UK are using drone Images and 3D modelling software capability, this technology effectively allows the crime scene investigator to freeze the scene, reexamine the scene and provide accurate evidential data to secure convictions. Drones have an added advantage of fast deployment, with some drones able to deploy within 45 seconds and stay in the air for one hour, even for up-to 23 hours when tethered. Tethered drones are an ideal solution when there is a large crowd, in one place, that requires monitoring i.e. a festival. It gives Emergency command and control instant live feed of the event, providing the ability to deploy officers or emergency workers where needed.

The Fire and Rescue service can, for example, deploy drones where access is limited or if a major incident is declared, providing fire fighters on the ground and incident command with live thermal and standard images of the scene, invaluable imagery for deployment and critical data for firefighter safety. Search and Rescue teams have often relied upon helicopters and fixed wing aircraft to search large areas in the aftermath of disasters and the search for missing persons, with costs from £3,000 upwards this method can be costly. Drones have the ability to deploy rapidly on location or from a distance with BVLOS (beyond visual line of sight) permissions. Search and Rescue services used drones in major disasters providing advanced imagery and data, allowing senior decision makers to act methodically in the search for life and damage mitigation, all at a fraction of the cost.

Can drones really help in the fight against COVID-19?

Drones are very capable; they have proven their worth to thousands of businesses and have been an invaluable asset to emergency services. In this unprecedented situation, thousands of lives have and continue to be lost to COVID-19, the message is clear: ‘Stay at Home, Protect the NHS and Save Lives’.

There are many drone providers across the world, notably China, trialling new ways to protect their people against this virus, from drones spraying chemicals to delivering vital supplies to care workers. UK regulations currently do not support this use, nor do we have the capability as drone service providers to implement this type of support at scale, what we can do is mobilise our network of nearly 6,000 UK CAA approved remote pilots to get our drones in the air.

We can monitor government isolation laws, prevent gatherings, provide transport movement data to local government and announce government messages via drone public speaker technology, seen recently by Northamptonshire Police who announced the addition of eight drones to their service. L

FURTHER INFORMATION