Safeguarding means protecting a citizen’s health, wellbeing and human rights; enabling them to live free from harm, abuse and neglect.
It is a concept embedded in The Children Act 1989, 2004 and the Care Act 2014. We believe that safeguarding is everybody’s business and have put measures in place to protect those least able to protect themselves.
We recognise that harm can occur anywhere, not just at home and we have a dedicated safeguarding team. Our safeguarding team works closely with partner agencies with the aim to ensure every baby, child, young person and adult who uses our services is free from abuse or neglect. Everyone at the trust works to help protect them and promote their welfare.
One aspect of care where this is evident is that of domestic abuse. We host a specialist worker for domestic abuse and our staff have established systems to support the recognition of domestic abuse and work with the aim of reducing violence against women and girls (VAWG).
Mental Capacity and Deprivation of Liberty
We recognise that some patients using our services, might not be able to make decisions about a specific health issue when they need to. This could be due to a diagnosis of dementia or other mental disorder; diagnosis of a learning disability; acquired brain injury; stroke; delirium or the effects of alcohol and/or drugs etc. Our staff are encouraged to adhere to the principles of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA) and its code of practice.
The MCA 2005 provides a legal framework for people from 16 years of age who lack capacity to make specific decisions for themselves and sets out who can take decisions, in which situations, and how they should go about this. All staff complete mandatory training on MCA. Further training and advice are offered by specialist staff within the safeguarding team.
If a patient on one of our hospital wards cannot consent to their care and treatment on the ward and restrictions are placed on them, staff are required to consider the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DOLs). DOLs is part of the Mental Capacity Act. It provides a legal framework for depriving someone of their liberty on the ward who cannot consent to this and who meets the criteria for DOLs. If a patient meets the criteria a referral is made to the Local Authority.