Maximum temperature when working in a nursing home?
Im a healthcare worker in a nursing home. Im seeking advice as to whether there is a legal maximum temperature for both employees and service users. We currently have no air conditioning, only standard cooling fans (which only seem to circulate warm air!) There are hot water pipes
While of course nursing homes should have air conditioning, I do not beleive there is a legal requirement for them to have them. If you are unhappy with working conditions, merley go somewhere else to work.
Since nursing homes have to have workers present, no condition in the home could allow workers not to go to work.
Also prisons havve no air conditioning normally, and often little fan to move the air. Thier guards work hot and sweaty.
also nursing homes before air did not have it
With all do respect, get used to it. I don’t even get the fans and I work in a warehouse. I also work 12 hour days. I highly doubt that there are legal limits on it. Now if this were being exposed to the “guests” I guess you would call them, then that might be a different story, and even then i don’t know since it wasa choice matter.
I don’t believe that there is a maximum temp as such but your employers do have a duty of care to their employees and therefore if you feel that you are being neglected or mistreated, you should contact your union or failing that contact your local citizens advice bureau.
The key question is “Is it a reasonable expectation that you would be kept cool in heatwave climes?” In fairness you are not the only people suffering in this heatwave, air conditioning is expensive to install and therefore many workers find themselves without it and unlike you, do not get the fans either.
i work in a carehome and its blo*dy hot, and so are the residents which make them irritable, it is unfair to all that work and live in the home, but not a lot can be done about it, just drink plenty of water and make sure that the residents drink plenty also….
If you are so peeved over it go out and spend your own money and buy a fan. Stp whining over being hot at work in the hot weather. I suppose you expect them to give you a heated coat for you to walk to work in in winter in case you are cold.
There should be a Senior Protective Care within your community, probably within the same offices as you would report Elder Abuse.The State is more than likely the one you can turn to for assistance, more for the residents than for the workers since they are there 24hrs. a day not just during work. However, when you get cooling for the residents you will be helping yourself at the same time. By the way, store such as Wal-mart and Target sell window unit air conditioners for less than $100
Sorry but the UK doesn’t have a legal MAXIMUM working temperature, just a legal minimum.
If you are in the UK, see this link
http://www.bfawu.org/health-temperature.htm
The temperature shoulkd be ”reasonable” which they suggest is 24 degrees. It is very dangerous for older people to be exposed to high temperatures, sometimes fatal. Blowing germs around in hot air, or the waft of incontinence is unpleasant and risky.
You can, anonymously if you wish, contact the local Nursing Home Inspectorate, who check the conditions in all registered NH’s. You can get the number from your local council/ Social Services – it is probably stuck on a wall somewhere too.
Doing poorly paid, but important jobs, should not mean you ‘have to put up with it’! That’s insulting. We should value older people and their carers more highly.