Protecting older people in a safe, caring and respectful environment is the aim of new standards published by the independent nursing home watchdog.
Speaking in Dublin at the launch of the new standards, Chief Executive of the Health Information and Quality Authority, Dr Treacy Cooper, said the need for the standards had already been demonstrated.
The 32 quality standards are published by the HIQA, which was established by the Oireachtas in the wake of the Leas Cross scandal. An investigation exposed elder abuse in the north Dublin nursing home three years ago.
For the first time regulation will extend to State-run residential settings, while upgrading standards of inspection in private and voluntary institutions.
But Dr Cooper emphasised that HIQA will only take over responsibility for registering and inspecting homes after the Minister for Health and Children gives the green light.
He said HIQA would also have to wait for Mary Harney's Department to conduct an assessment of how new regulations which it will write to enforce the standards will impact on all relevant parties.
A spokesman for HIQA said the Department may decide to introduce new legislation.
Speaking earlier on RTÉ Radio's Morning Ireland, Eamon Timmons of Age Action Ireland said that the new standards include a requirement on homes to consult residents about policy and to be seen to take their comments on board.
On the same programme, Nursing Homes Ireland CEO Tadgh Daly welcomed the standards. However, he said they would have cost implications for nursing homes.
Today's standards are the fruit of a controversial process sparked almost three years ago by Prime Time's exposure of abuses, including neglect, of residents in Leas Cross nursing home in north Dublin.
Since then the home has been closed. But the HSE's performance in enforcing existing standards was criticised in Professor Des O'Neill's official report into the scandal.
