Lawmaker Urges Minimal Use Of Restraints On Elderly

Labour Party lawmaker Fernando Cheung has called on the government to deploy more resources to the city's elderly care homes in order to make sure residents there are properly taken care of with the minimal use of restraints.

His comment comes after the Medical Council earlier this week found six private doctors guilty of signing off on restraining procedures for elderly residents at care homes without proper assessment in 2016.

The watchdog found the doctors' signatures and chops on incomplete restrainment forms, with key information such as medical assessments, and even the patients' names and dates missing.

One of the doctors was banned from practising for a month, while two of them were struck off the general register for a month, suspended for six months. The rest, meanwhile, were simply issued warning letters.

Cheung said this practice of signing incomplete restrainment forms was quite common to make it easier for doctors to exercise restraints on elderly residents.

He said that the use of these restraints causes "severe damage" to those being restrained, both physically and mentally.

"Immobility would weaken the muscles, and in the long-run people could lose their function or abilities to walk or use their hands, and also psychologically it caused a lot of damage," he said.

"Some lose the functions and lose the ability to care for themselves and also in the end it makes them lose the will to live on."

He said the recent ruling by the Medical Council would not have a deterrent effect, saying the punishments issued to the six doctors was not proportional to the damage suffered by those put in restraints.

He told RTHK's Priscilla Ng that the law on this has to be revised and amended, and the government needs to commit to increasing manpower at care homes.

"The most often-used excuse is lack of care and manpower, because the standards are low. For example during the evening the staffing ratio is one to 60 residents, and even during the day we’re talking about one to 20 or one to 40," he said.