Family Fears As Midlothain Care Home Set To Close

A nursing home in Midlothian is set to close down despite concerns that residents will be moved away from their friends and families.

Mayburn House in Loanhead, run by the Church of Scotland, is to shut next spring in a move that will see 24 residents transferred to a new council facility in Gorebridge.

The facility, which has received Midlothian Council and Lothian Health funding in recent years, could be turned into a new housing scheme after the residents are moved.

But residents and community leaders have raised fears that elderly people being cared for in the home face isolation from their families if they are moved.

Loanhead Community Council chairman Pat Kenny said: “It doesn’t help people with family and relatives in that care home at the present moment. They have been in that care home for years and will be taken out of their own community.”

A spokesman for CrossReach, the Church of Scotland’s social care council, said: “The funding package in place for the operation of Mayburn House has been expected to come to an end in spring 2008 for some time.

“As the facility is owned by CrossReach but funded by Midlothian Council, this is fundamentally a matter for Midlothian Council.

“CrossReach is dedicated to working with the local authority to ensure that the transition period for residents is as smooth as possible.”