A FRUSTRATED grandson has deemed the closure of an East Dorset care home “unacceptable” as he now has to find a new home for his grandmother.

Laurence Taylor’s 97-year-old grandmother has lived at the Hyacinth Care Home in Wimborne since 2019, and the home is set to close for a “major refurbishment”.

Laurence told the Daily Echo: “Relatives of the residents were informed completely out of the blue that management were to close the home in January 2021.

“This decision was delivered without apology or empathy, and without prior consultation.

“The explanation – that the building requires improvement – is weak at best, and certainly doesn’t appear to be urgent.

“To demand that she and the other residents relocate during the Covid-19 pandemic and in the middle of winter, represents an outrageous abandonment of care at a time when the elderly are already extremely vulnerable.”

Laurence said he has not found a new home for his grandmother yet because the process takes some time.

He continued: “The current context makes visiting alternative homes to establish their suitability virtually impossible, not least given that my own mother, who would be doing the visiting, is also attempting to shield due to an existing condition.

“It took over six months of searching to establish my grandmother in a care home that suited her needs and budget, and so even outside of current circumstances, this news would have been a blow and represented a severe disruption to her life.

“To ask her to uproot her life in this way at a time which is already extremely distressing for residents of care homes borders on inhumane.”

Laurence’s grandmother pays more than £4,000 a month to live at the Hyacinth Care Home, and Laurence said his issue is with the lack of communication from the regional management of the home.

He added: “I would like to ask in the strongest terms that Barchester Healthcare (who look after Hyacinth) delay this closure until such a time that residents won’t be put at risk.

“The company has at no point presented any urgent need for residents to move and I would suggest that they cannot abandon their duty of care to such an egregious level at a time of national crisis.

“At very least Barchester Healthcare should be offering to accommodate residents within their existing and new homes within the local area.”

A spokesperson from Barchester Healthcare said: “We can confirm that we will be closing Hyacinth care home to invest in a major refurbishment of the home and that we have informed our residents and relatives giving them notice of this with time to adapt to this change.

“We realise that this is a difficult message and we understand how important it is to support them through this, and our teams are doing all they can to ensure that the move is as easy as possible.

“They are working with residents and families, and where applicable the local authorities and Continuing Healthcare, to support them in finding alternative homes that are suitable for their individual needs.”