'It's like a second childhood': Extra care home offers new lease of life for 'able and independent' elderly

Living in an ‘extra care’ home is like having a “second childhood”, a 94-year-old resident says.

Peter Shears lives at Lapwing Apartments, a complex of 54 flats run by Cross Keys Homes in Orton Brimbles.

He says he “gets on like a house on fire” with other residents, regaling them with “naughty stories” when they gather each day for tea.

“There’s one or two oddballs, like there is everywhere,” he joked, “but I couldn’t be in a better place.”

Other activities on offer for residents at the facility include gardening, arts and crafts, quizzes, bowling and movie nights (the latest offering: Carry on Camping).

There’s also a restaurant which is open to the public and an on site care team for residents for when they need it.

This is what makes Lapwing Apartments an ‘extra care’ facility rather than a traditional care home, in which residents typically receive more intensive support.

The set up allows residents, who must be 65 and over to live at Lapwing, to live semi-independently in their own rented space, decorated to their liking, with friends and family free to visit as they please.

Manager Karen Parker says the set up is beneficial for the increasingly elderly population coming into social housing who remain “very able and independent” into their eighties and nineties.

“People are living longer and remaining very independent, some of them,” she said. “It’s nice for them to know that they can come and live somewhere like this independently, but stay if their health and needs change.

“The care and support is here for them and we’ll get equipment in place for them if they need it,” she said.

All residents have lifeline alarms in their apartments, while some have extra accommodations for any specific vulnerabilities.

Demand for residency at Lapwing Apartments, which opened in 2017, is high, Ms Parker says.

“We do have a good waiting list,” she said. “Extra care is getting quite popular now people are realising what it’s all about.”

Another resident, Grace Banks, 86, says “everyone’s so friendly” at Lapwing.

She’s been there almost since it opened and brings the biscuits to the residents’ daily tea and catch up session.

Like Mr Shears, she initially moved into the apartment complex alongside her spouse; both spouses have since passed away.

Mr Shears said he “didn’t initially want to come”, but now “they can’t get rid of me”.

He moved to Glinton after 35 years working at Lloyds Bank, before moving first to Clifton Court retirement community in Parnwell and finally onto Lapwing.

Mr Shears grew up in London in the 1940s and says his childhood home was destroyed by a WW2 bomb after he was evacuated – but, a lifelong trouble-maker, he fled his new home under the cover of night and returned to his parents at their new home in Ealing.

Ms Banks, a Posh fan, says she’s “Peterborough born and bred” and has lived in the city her entire life.

She has a sister in Matley and is visited by her son and daughter who live further afield.

Cross Keys manager Tracey Lowndes says the housing company offers “not just different housing solutions, but different care solutions” for people with different levels of need.

“We work to support people wherever they need it,” she said. “We’ve got the community-based service which goes into our retirement houses and other homes across Peterborough.”

Alongside Lapwing, the company also runs extra care complex Kingfisher Court in Stanground as well as sheltered accommodation and houses under shared ownership.

Cross Keys is also one of 10 housing associations which offer accommodation to people on Peterborough City Council’s housing register when it becomes available.