54 minutes agoShareSaveCatriona MacPheeBBC Scotland DisclosureShareSaveBBCIn my seven weeks undercover in an overstretched care home I witnessed many scenes of poor care and distress but there was one incident that I suspect will remain with me for a long time.On the worst days, when staffing was at its lowest levels, the residents would sometimes shout for help as they heard my cleaning trolley rumbling past their rooms. Some were desperate for help to go to the toilet, others simply wanted to get washed and dressed for the day.As a cleaner, there was little I could do except offer words of comfort and assurances that I’d told the care staff.One day I sat with a woman in a nightie who needed help to be taken from her bed to the bathroom, just 8ft away. Her room echoed with signs of a life well lived – a proud career, foreign holidays with her loving family, an immaculately curated wardrobe of cashmere cardigans.As we waited for a carer to come, she begged me not to leave. She was becoming increasingly uncomfortable.I tried to distract her with small talk about the view and the weather. She listened until she could no longer hide her distress. As her physical capacity to wait for the toilet finally crumbled, she began to sob.I felt sadness many times in the care home but that totally avoidable loss of dignity was the first time I felt anger.Our investigation was sparked by an interview with Susan Christie, whose father spent two years in Castlehill, the largest care home in Inverness.It is billed as a luxury home and charges up to £1,800 per week.But Susan had become so concerned by the standard of her father’s care that she installed a secret camera in his room – and she was appalled by what she saw.”He wasn’t being washed properly, he was being left in an incontinence pad for in excess of 12 hours, never taken to the toilet, food placed out of reach, spilling hot porridge on himself,” she told us.”It was neglect.”The final straw came when a cleaner was filmed restraining the elderly man and violently shaking the bed frame before prodding him with a walking stick. He was later sacked and Susan had nine complaints upheld by the Care Inspectorate.She moved her father out of Castlehill in May.In order to compare Castlehill to the 1,000 other care homes across Scotland, the BBC sent a Freedom of Information request to sector regulator, the Care Inspectorate, to ask which care homes in Scotland had the most complaints upheld against them.Castlehill topped the list with 10 complaints upheld in 2024.We interviewed a further four families who all had stories of similar concerns – but they were all historical.The only way to judge whether this was still going on was to go in and see for ourselves. We went through the rigorous BBC internal processes of asking for permission to secretly film. There was judged to be a significant public interest in evidence-gathering of this nature.In May I found myself phoning the care home to ask if there were any cleaning jobs going. I was invited for an interview and asked to start immediately.At the same time, the home was in special measures due to improvement notices issued by the Care Inspectorate over a range of issues.They were under the spotlight – surely things would improve?What I found was an understaffed home that didn’t have the right mix of staff to deal with the basic needs of residents, particularly those with dementia.This was leading to distress, aggressive behaviour and crisis situations. As I wheeled my cleaning trolley round the corridors, I was acutely aware of pleading faces peering out of bedrooms, hoping for a few minutes of company and conversation.Those people, at least, still hoped for a moment of human connection. I came to realise others had given up.One day I reassured a man who needed the toilet: “I’ve told the carers, they say they’re coming.””Aye, so is Christmas,” he replied.Of all the things I tried to prepare for before going undercover I hadn’t anticipated forming genuine bonds with the people who lived in there.The reality of this hit me one day while I sat in my car on a …
