Abbeyfield House, a care home in Kilwinning Road, Irvine, has ranked amongst the top two per cent of those in Scotland in The Times newspaper’s ‘league table’ of care homes.

The report concentrated in the standard of care provided by home, especially focussing on the health, wellbeing, safety and quality of life enjoyed by residents.

This emphasised that everyone has the right to good quality, compassionate care, which meets their needs and respects their rights.

Ranking 14th out of 800 care homes was Abbeyfield House in Irvine, the highest performing in North Ayrshire and within the top two per cent in the nation.

It is much earned recognition for the staff at the home who have been working tirelessly over the years, including an extremely difficult time for the sector throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.

Tricia Morrison, unit manager at Abbeyfield, commented: “It heightens awareness, I think care homes in general, they’ve been in the public eye, but not individual homes.

“When you hear about one bad report, we’re all tarred with the same brush, but maybe now with Covid away it will lighten it and people will see that we’re all individuals.”

She added how nice it has been for not only staff at the home but those with relatives in their care.

Tricia added: “It’s quite nice for relatives to see that the choice that they made was the right choice.”

She also pointed to how challenging things became during the pandemic, and how well her staff adapted.

She continued: “My staff already know what I think about them, as far as I’m concerned they’re the best in the business.

“It was very difficult in the beginning because some of the residents didn’t quite understand why their relatives weren’t coming.

“From the physical point of view, the residents were all in their room, all the activities and social and emotional side had to be done in each room.

“Every single person had to be dealt with individually. It could be quite emotional for the staff as well.”

All staff at Abbeyfield are also looking forward to being able to hold their garden fundraiser over Marymass as the festival returns properly again this year.

“We hope to see everyone

at Marymass,” Tricia concluded.