There is a requirement that in every care home there is a PEEP (Personal Emergency Evacuation Plan) for each person who lives in the home.

 We have developed 3 documents to support this; 

• A PEEPs in Care Homes Guidance document with in-depth information including grab bag contents, a PEEP development guide and RA for PEEP storage

• An individual RAG rated PEEP form – easily updated and with all the relevant information on one-page for easy reference.

•  A PEEP overview spreadsheet that allows you to collate the list of people living in the home and to keep this updated. This overview is invaluable in those first few minutes of an evacuation and will help to prioritise the actions of both your staff and the emergency services. Important details such as Oxygen cylinders and airflow mattresses should be detailed.

 It is the responsibility of the registered manager and provider to be fully aware of the need to manage your premises well to ensure the safety and well-being of your residents from fire at all times. Your staff must be trained to prevent or limit the risk of fire, recognise and neutralise potential fire hazards, and know how to respond to an emergency individually and collectively by actions and communications.

Good management of fire safety is essential to ensure that, if a fire does occur and grow, your staff are able to ensure that everyone in your premises is able to escape to safety easily and quickly or remain in safety. You, therefore, need to have robust and well-kept procedures and have emergency plans in place so that everyone (and in particular your staff, since they will have a critical role) know how to respond to a fire in your premises.

In Care Homes, many of the residents are likely to require at least some form of staff assistance to evacuate the building in case of fire. This may be in the form of help, guidance or special equipment to allow them to evacuate rapidly and safely. PEEPs (Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans) form an essential element of emergency fire planning. They are intended to identify the evacuation needs of each individual within the home. In order to be maximally efficient, they need to be kept up to date to recognise changes in health, medication etc, and ideally even temporary issues such as injuries.

Having robust fire safety policies and procedures, including accurate PEEPs comes under Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014: Regulation 12.