Smoking In Care Homes

Regarding the recent article on Radio 4 You & Yours programme about the prosecution of a care home operator following the tragic death of an elderly resident in a fire caused by smoking in a bedroom.

Over the last three years of carrying out health & safety audits of care homes, we have seen smoking rooms for service users being completely phased out to be replaced by external designated smoking shelters.

The radio programme also referred to care staff ignoring signs of illicit smoking within rooms. This is certainly not something we have witnessed either during audits or during fire safety training.