Activities at Laurel Bank Care Home

Staff at Barchester’s Laurel Bank care home in Lancaster have stepped in to help a local carer in her hour of need.  Tragically, Louise Chambers, who was born and bred in Preston, was recently diagnosed with a brain tumour and told there was no cure.  She is only 44 years of age.  She very quickly started to lose feeling in the left hand side of her body and when she lost the ability to walk, Lou started a go fund me page to try to raise the money she needed to buy an electric wheelchair.  Laurel Bank’s kind-hearted Head of Maintenance, Kerry Ohara, saw the fundraising page and immediately asked the General Manager at the home if they could help.  

Happily, the home had an electric wheelchair that had been left to them by a former resident and they were only too happy to gift it to Lou who is over the moon to be able to regain some of her independence. Lou used to work as a carer for a young boy but sadly her diagnosis has meant that she is no longer able to work.

This is Audrey who lives at laurel Bank. Audrey used to be a teacher for primary school children and one thing she loved to do is read to them. We now encourage Audrey to carry on reading to us. Her favourite book is the owl and the Pussy cat.  Audrey will read to anyone and loves to put on her best story voice for us all.

Residents at laurel Bank love trips out! We took the gentlemen out to Morecambe for a stroll down the prom it was very cold but it didn’t dampen the mood of the fellas. We had a lovely meal at The Bow Window café and enjoyed a nice hot drink to warm us all up.

Staff and residents from Barchester’s care home, in Laurel Bank, joined fellow keen quizzers from over 250 Barchester care homes and hospitals across the whole of the UK, including Wales, Scotland, Jersey and the Isle of Wight, to put their collective general knowledge to the test.

The inaugural Barchester Big Quiz of the Year took place on 9th January 2024 when Laurel Bank got super competitive and took on its sister homes from all over the country to find out which Barchester home or hospital had the best quizzers.  From historical humdingers and musical musings to pictorial puzzlers and connective conundrums, the homes battled it out to find out who would prevail.

For a few weeks now Ralph had been saying that he wouldn’t mind a trip on the big wheel at Dalton square after he had spotted it on the way back from a trip to see the panto Christmas Carol. Ralph said at 91 and never been on a big wheel. So we had to make his dream come true and take him on it. Ralph had the best time he also enjoyed his favourite drink hot chocolate while he was out and came back smiling the whole day!

Laurel bank decided to their very own bake off with staff baking lots of Christmas treats an the residents taste testing them before placing their votes on which they like best. Here was also lots made so that we could have our own bake sale in the reception area. The winner of the competition was Lyndsay the manager who had no experience in baking whatsoever but did very well and won with her chocolate brownies.