Mental Capacity Act

The Mental Capacity Act 2005 came into full force in October last year. The Act is designed to safeguard both the vulnerable and the people that care for them.

All professional staff involved in the care and treatment of a person must keep a record of long term or significant decisions about mental capacity. The record should show:

What the decision was

Why the decision was made

How the decision was made

Such records provide evidence for staff if they face civil or criminal charges or complaints.

The Ablyss Care Management System, CMS, provides a comprehensive yet simple to use solution that incorporates mental capacity assessments into its care-planning module with ease.

The CMS mental capacity assessment asks the questions:

• What triggered the need for the assessment?
• Who was consulted about the decision?
• What was the nature of the decision?
• How have you determined capacity? (A detailed functional test helps you to answer this)
• Have you considered the person’s best interest? (Specific questions with regard to best interest are asked)

The assessment can be customised, should the need arise, and every time a new assessment is performed a history trail is generated. This makes it easy to show when capacity has been assessed and how it has changed over time.

We have consulted with Learning Difficulties, Nursing and Residential EMI homes to gain the best overall perspective of how the Act needs to be incorporated into your ongoing care solutions. If you would like to find out more about how the Metal capcity Assessments have been built inot the care planning module, email us for a link to our demo.