Copy of Editorial Featured in Dartmouth Chronicle 21st September 2012

One of Devon’s finest residential care homes

According to the Office for National Statistics (2001 census) there were 2,393 people over the age of 85 living in South Hams. Of these 30% (718) are likely to suffer from dementia and require care. This figure will double within a generation.

 

It seems counterintuitive therefore that over the 11 years since the census was completed more care homes have closed in South Hams than have been opened leading many people considering residential care in the future to ask themselves where, within a reasonable travelling distance, are they going to find a suitable home? 

Yvonne and Stephen Mould have long been committed to making HYNE TOWN HOUSE one of the finest residential care homes in Devon. They recognised the growing demand for high quality residential care and have recently completed a comprehensive refurbishment and extension of their highly regarded home in Strete, between Dartmouth and Kingsbridge. The extension provides 9 new bedrooms all of which enjoy en-suite facilities, satellite TV and under-floor heating. The rooms are large, bright and individually decorated and furnished to a very high standard. They have also created a new quiet lounge on the first floor, in addition to the 2 lounges on the ground floor, with glorious sea views. 

HYNE TOWN HOUSE currently employs over 30 local people. The extension will create additional opportunities for those with experience and, as a recognised training provider, new recruits who wish to take advantage of the excellent training provided to become highly qualified care support staff. 

The project incorporates 2 purpose-built Assisted Living apartments which have been designed to encourage occupants to remain as independent as possible but with the reassurance that expert help is immediately at hand should the need arise. Each apartment is finished to an exacting specification reflecting the ethos of the Home and will provide luxurious surroundings for up to 2 people in each apartment. The generous accommodation includes private entrance, living room with dining area, fitted kitchen incorporating an oven, hob, fridge and washing machine, double bedroom and large bathroom with shower. A large wall mounted flat-screen TV is installed with satellite service provision. 

With an aging population and families becoming ever more dispersed, many of us are faced with the daunting responsibility of finding first class care for family and friends. Discovering an elderly relative or friend needs residential care is hard enough, finding the right home to provide the dedicated care they require can be even harder. A visit to HYNE TOWN HOUSE will help to make that decision for you.

 

 

Douglas Derry Celebrates his 93rd Birthday with Friends at

Hyne Town House

 

 

More images of residents with the Olympic Torch.

(Can you spot the odd one out?)

 

 

Olympic Fever (Article in Dartmouth Gazette)

The Olympic torch made its way to HYNE TOWN HOUSE in Strete. Near Dartmouth.

The torch was kindly brought into the care home by Gill Knight 49, from Galmpton. Gill said she was thrilled to be chosen to carry the torch through Dartmouth. 

Residents at the Hyne Town House have enjoyed "Olympic fever", and have followed the competition on the television said Jean White, the Home's Manager.  

Pictured with the torch are Muriel Schroeter a resident at the Home and Lynne Turner one of the care support workers.

 

 

Hyne Town House Newsletter

Winter Edition 2011

The New Year is now well underway but I’d like to take this opportunity to wish you a healthy and prosperous 2011

Hyne Town House had a fun packed schedule of events leading up to Christmas and I hope both residents and their families enjoyed the entertainment available, A big thank you to Jean for organising such a wonderful festive season.

The Endsleigh Garden Centre Trip.

One of the highlights of the festivities was our day trip to Endsleigh Garden Centre. The event was arranged by Annie Morgan who, as part of her apprentership training, was asked to fund and organise an outing for the residents.

Annie began by organising a jumble sale in Strete Village Hall to raise money towards the cost of the trip. She then hired a minibus and along with other members of staff took the residents for a very enjoyable day out.

Although the weather was cold, a number of residents enjoyed a walk around the indoor areas of the garden centre which had beautiful displays of Christmas trees and decorations.

The trip ended with afternoon tea and delicious mince pies.

The Tree of Light.

Hyne Town House was asked by Stoke Fleming Church to supply a Christmas tree to be displayed in the church leading up to Christmas.

Helen Drury, our resident activities coordinator, organised for the residents and staff to make their own decorations for the tree.

The name of the tree “The Tree of Light” was chosen by one of our residents. The residents, families and members of staff all contributed and an enormous amount of fun and laughter was generated whilst making the decorations.

Christmas Gifts

I hope the suggestions of gift ideas for the residents proved useful when choosing Christmas gifts. We are still trying to put together memory boards and photograph albums for the residents. Any help or contributions would be most welcome.

Extension Work to Hyne Town House

The much heralded project to build a 1^st floor extension above part of the existing single storey west wing now looks likely to commence at the end of April / beginning of May.

As previously outlined, the extension will provide 9 new bedrooms, a new 1^st floor lounge overlooking the sea, an improved ramp at the entrance of the home, a larger entrance hall, a new bathroom on the 2^nd floor and upgrading to all the existing bedrooms. These upgrades will include the replacement of night storage heaters with conventional radiators, more electric sockets in the west wing, improved lighting in bedrooms, a pressurised hot water system on the 1^st and 2^nd floors in the main building in line with the rest of the home and much more.

Inevitably this will mean that some residents will need to be temporarily relocated in other rooms while the work is being carried out. However, we have deliberately retained enough empty rooms to ensure that any disturbance is kept to a minimum.

The project, divided into 3 phases, is expected to take about 30 weeks although the longest period that any resident is likely to be effected is phase 1 which is scheduled to take 14 weeks. (See attached Schedule)

Interestingly, whenever we have carried out building work in the past, residents have enjoyed watching the activity taking place and the comings and goings of the builders.

Needless to say, the comfort and safety of our residents will be our priority throughout the work.

The Firs

As some of you will be aware, we applied for planning permission to convert The Firs (the property to the left of the driveway as you come into the car-park) into 2 separate assisted living apartments at the end of last year. I am delighted to say that the planning consent has now come through and work will commence to convert the property and increase the size of the car-park during the next few weeks.

Unfortunately, for safety reasons, the car-park will not be available to visitors while this work is taking place.

Whilst it was never envisaged to be this way, it is now inevitable that the 2 projects will run concurrently.

When the project is finished we will be able to offer:

Hyne Town House: 38 places in 37 bedrooms, all of which will offer en-suite facilities

The Firs: 2 assisted living apartments for up to 2 people each and

The Lodge, an assisted living bungalow for up to 2 people 

Happy Birthday to You…………………………

Residents:                            

                                               

                                                Anne Wreford-Brown                      21^st February

                                                Yolanda Ball                                     6^th March                                                      

Staff                            ;           Jane Webb                                        24^th January

                                                Erik Struben                                      1^st March

                                                Anna Ebong                                     11^th March

Forthcoming Events

Friday 18th February 11am            Happy Times with Pauline Carter

Tuesday 8^th March 3pm                  Cream Tea with friends and family

Friday 1^st April 11am                       Happy Times with Pauline Carter               

Wednesday 13^th April 3pm             Music Concert with Mark Patten

Thursday   14^th April 11am             Coffee Morning & raffle. Friends and family

                                                            Welcome

Sunday   24^th April 3pm                  Easter Bonnet Parade with cream tea

                

Contributions for the newsletter from residents,

 staff and families are always  welcome.

Yvonne Mould

+

Newsletter Autumn 2010

Hyne Town House Newsletter

Autumn Edition 2010

http://www.hynetownhouse.co.uk/

We have had a busy summer of activities at Hyne Town House which I hope you have all enjoyed.

The Marie Curie Tea Party was a big success and our Summer Garden Party proved to be a fun afternoon for all despite it clashing with the England Football game. The Dementia Awareness talk, held in The Village Hall, was well supported with over 20 people attending.

Marie Curie Tea Party

 

                Specialist Activity Workshops

Our specialist activity workshops will be starting in late September. We will be designing stimulating activities, tailored to each person’s individual needs, with the aim of improving their quality of life and encouraging independence. This will help to reduce confusion, encourage social interaction, restore self esteem, regain basic life skills and generally have fun.

Helen Drury, who is taking on the role of Activities co-ordinator, was a Community Psychiatric Nurse In her previous life. Helen is, therefore, well qualified to make sure the activities are tailored to the resident’s needs.

                        Christmas Shopping

Hard to believe I know but our focus is now turning to Christmas!

We thought the residents’ families might like some ideas for Christmas presents and Jean has given me a shopping list of useful suggestions:

Bath robes, nightwear (it is advisable to get a size larger than normally worn as it is less intrusive when someone is helping to dress) soap, toilet bags, costume jewellery and scarves. A portable DVD player with favourite films or music or CD player with talking books or favourite music.

Books of interest, whether it be a previous hobby, about an area they lived or a person they admired. It is best to contain a small amount of text and lots of pictures.

What can be really helpful both for the residents and carers are multi- picture photo frames with the photos labelled or a digital photo frame. This  provides a conversation point for the carer. Similarly a book containing messages and photos from the family, perhaps including drawings from grandchildren is a very personal gift.

A life history of the person, put together by the family, is a special gift as it provides many happy memories for the resident to be shared with carers and family alike. 

Planning Application

They say everything comes to he who waits, and boy did we have to wait for our planning application to finally get approval. However, nearly 2 years after submitting it we finally got approval early in September.

Our plan is to build 9 new bedrooms above the ground floor west wing which runs parallel to the driveway. Because we are required to provide a minimum of 4.1M2 of communal space per resident, a couple of existing bedrooms will be converted into a new lounge/activities room on the 1^st floor, overlooking the sea.

We are also taking the opportunity to upgrade the existing facilities within the home for the benefit of all. These include:

1. All bedrooms will have en-suite facilities
2. All bedrooms will exceed the requirements of the Care Standards Act 2000
3. Upgrading the heating system throughout.
4. Installing a pressurised hot water system in main building
5. Widening the entrance and re-aligning the slope to make wheelchair access easier
6. Increasing the size of the entrance hall.
7. Increasing the size of the laundry
8. Creating a new medication room.
9. Creating a new shower room on the 2^nd floor.
10. Upgrading the wet room on the ground floor, etc etc

The net result will be that the home’s maximum number of residents will increase from 33 to 38.

Inevitably there will be some disruption during the project but we will do our best to keep this to a minimum. We have deliberately kept rooms empty to allow us to temporarily move residents to areas away from the building work ensuring they remain in a safe and comfortable environment.

We hope to commence the work in January 2011 and, if anyone is interested, we would be delighted to show them the plans and to discuss the project in detail.

It has always been our ambition for Hyne Town House to be the best care home in Devon and these improvements will go a long way to help us achieve that goal.

Forthcoming Events

First Thursday every month                   Music Concert with Neil from True Care

Tuesday 26^th October 3pm                      “A Trip Down Memory Lane “

                                                                        Musical Entertainment with Martyn Paddon.

Afternoon Tea and Raffle.

Monday 20^th December 3pm                   Christmas Concert

Wednesday 22^nd December 3pm           Christmas Party.

Sherry, mince pies and musical entertainment

                                                                         All friends and families welcome.

As always we will have a full diary of entertainment throughout December.

Happy Birthday To you….

Phyll Cudd                           27^th October

Phyllis Teage                      22^nd November

Paddy Davis                        26^th November

Patricia Cannon                 15^th December

Staff

Lynne Turner                      5^th October

Mal Thomas                        12^th October         

Jean White                          15^th October

Penelope Foster                17^th October

Shirley Friend                    11^th November

Scott Caple                         11^th November

Samson Esplago               15^th November

Gemma Caple                      4^th December

Cheralyn Owens                 9^th December

Finally………

Phyllis Teage wanted to share this with you…

The Thoughts of a Gold Fish

As I wander around my bowl many thoughts cloud my tiny brain.

Errrr……now then what was I saying again?  (By Andrew Jagger.)

The next Newsletter will be the winter edition which will be published early in January. If you would like anything included please leave it in the office marked for my attention.

Yvonne Mould

Dementia Awareness Talk, Strete Village Hall

In association with National Dementia Awareness Week, Hyne Town House held a talk in Strete Village Hall on 28^th July 2010.

The speakers were introduced by Yvonne Mould, the owner of Hyne Town House and her husband Stephen gave a presentation illustrating the number of people affected by the disease. The audience were astonished to learn that that there are over 700 people in the South Hams, over the age of 85, already suffering from Dementia and that this figure is expected to rise to 1400 within 16 years. (According to figures extrapolated from The Office for National Statistics). This compares to the number of Dementia beds in South Hams of 274.

Heather Brooks, a Care Supervisor at the home went on to describe the different types of Dementia followed by Jean White, the home’s Manager, who outlined ways to recognise the signs, respond to needs and adapt the home.

The audience of over 30 people included volunteers from Dartmouth Caring. Wendy Curtis, a Dartmouth Caring Trustee, described the charity’s plans to open the Dartmouth Memory Cafe in September and described how Dartmouth Caring can help people suffering from Dementia and theirs carers.

It was very much a community affair with ladies from Strete WI generously donating their time to serve teas, coffees and cakes following the presentations.

The owners of the Hyne Town House have now been approached to see if they would be prepared to give a similar presentation to other groups within South Hams and they readily agreed. “Of course we will be delighted” said Yvonne Mould, “We are enthusiastic to be a part of any initiative that helps raise the profile of Dementia, dispels the myths and stigma associated with the disease and informs suffers and their carers“.