A CORONER has slammed the care given to six residents who died at a scandal-hit nursing home as he gave a withering summary of a catalogue of failings – accusing managers of “dehumanising” and “warehousing” the elderly.

Assistant Gwent Coroner Geraint Williams began summing up after hearing six weeks of evidence into the deaths of the residents at the Brithdir nursing home in New Tredegar.

He accused the owners and staff at the home of a “gross betrayal of the trust” placed in them by the relatives of the residents by keeping them in the dark of the poor standards of care.

Six residents, Stanley James, 89, June Hamer, 71, Stanley Bradford, 76, Edith Evans, 85, Evelyn Jones, 87, and William Hickman, 71, all died between 2003 and 2005.

They suffered dehydration, malnourishment, and pressure sores on their bodies.

In a lengthy summing up of the evidence, Mr Williams said: “The view of Margaret Moody, the nursing expert, and Professor Malcolm Hodkinson, the consultant geriatrician, was that the attitude of the staff at Brithdir was that residents were being ‘warehoused’.

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“They explained this as a situation where the residents were simply kept and were being fed and watered with the bare minimum being done and then the staff going home.

“I accept without hesitation that description of the philosophy.

“What is worse, in my judgment, is that even the feeding and watering, to use Prof Hodkinson’s phrase was inadequate given that some of the residents were admitted into hospital suffering from dehydration and malnutrition and that the bare minimum was resolutely below any acceptable standard.

“Such philosophy I find led inextricably to a neglectful and abuseful attitude on the part of many of the staff at Brithdir, which is clearly evidenced by the practice authorised and sanctioned by Peter Smith when he was the manager of changing the incontinence pads of residents in the lounge in the presence of other staff.

“He justified that practice on the basis that as the residents were suffering from dementia, they would not know what was happening to them.

“That practice I consider was one by which the residents were dehumanised and is perhaps the lowest point in the story of the Brithdir nursing home.

“I have no hesitation in confirming as an unequivocal fact all these matters contributed significantly to the deaths of Stanley James, Judith Hamer, William Hickman, Stanley Bradford, Edith Evans and Evelyn Jones.”

Mr Bradford’s daughter Gaynor Evans described her father as looking like an inmate from a prisoner of war camp because he was all skin and bone and he begged not to return to Brithdir while in hospital.

Residents were often unkempt and dirty, care plans would be ignored, documents falsified, and residents would be humiliated by staff.

One former staff member said she saw a care worker draw a moustache with a permanent marker on the face of a female resident.

During the inquest several Brithdir staff apologised for the “shocking lack of care”, which was “bordering on being negligent”.

Others said there was a “systematic failure of the system” at Brithdir with staffing levels “dire”, and carers having to provide their own PPE.

Relatives who raised concerns about the care their loved one was receiving were fobbed off after receiving a “good explanation”.

Brithdir was part of a group of 24 care homes owned by local GP Dr Prana Das and his Puretruce Health Care company.

Temporary embargoes on new residents were placed on Brithdir, regular inspections were carried out and improvements notices issued but it was not until 2006 the home finally closed.

Dr Das was known to be “very rude and offensive” with social care inspectors and would often launch legal challenges to decisions of regulators.

Social workers also failed to carry out regular assessment of the residents being funded by Caerphilly County Borough Council, with senior managers admitting there were “systemic failings” and it was “quite possible” they should have taken tougher action much earlier against Dr Das.

Police launched the Operation Jasmine inquiry in 2005 following the death of an elderly resident at another home.

The inquiry lasted nearly a decade and cost more than £11 million with detectives looking at 63 deaths.

Charges were brought against Dr Das and the Puretruce chief executive but the trial collapsed in 2013 after Dr Das suffered severe head injuries in an aggravated burglary at his home.

He died last year aged 73.

Dr Das had been the subject of complaints about his homes dating back to the mid-1990s and there had been a long history of involvement with the authorities.

In 2015 several staff were struck of the nursing register and others received suspensions.

A hearing into the death of a seventh resident, Matthew Higgins, 86, will be held following the conclusion of the other six.