All stars?

This week, the Commission for Social Care Inspection has launched its much-vaunted star ratings system for care homes. But are they a useful guide for the public or just a waste of time?

The theory is that the system of awarding care homes stars gives the public an at-a-glance guide to how good a home is; 3 stars means it’s an excellent home for you or your mum, 0 stars means it should be avoided and possibly be closed down.

So far, so good – after all, it works in the hotels industry, among others. But moving into a care home is a much more complicated business than looking for a hotel and should not be viewed in the same way – it is more like buying a house and should be treated with the same thorough research.

So for this reason, I wonder whether the star ratings will really make a difference. People looking for care homes are increasingly savvy and many already know of and use the freely available CSCI reports on care homes. These go into much more depth about the conditions there, judging it over 7 categories and listing what the home does well and does badly, rather than just an overall star rating.

For me, the star ratings will only be useful at the outset of a search for a care home. If someone is skimming a list of homes in an area, it will most likely mean that homes with poorer ratings will instantly be discounted.

But this will not save that much time because about 70% of care homes have received a 2 or 3-star rating so far and only 3% given a zero rating. While this is good news – it shows that the vast majority of care homes do provide a good service – it will not narrow the field down much for many people. So they will still have to complete the time-consuming legwork to find the right home for themselves or their loved one.