Care Certificate, Standard 8 of 15
Fluids and nutrition
Recognising dehydration and malnutrition early, including the signs that get missed, supporting people to eat and drink safely including with dysphagia, food record charts that mean something, and when to escalate.
Why this standard matters in practice
Dehydration is one of the most common avoidable reasons an older person is admitted to hospital from a care setting. The early signs are subtle, unglamorous and entirely learnable.
How it is assessed
The knowledge in this standard is assessed by a knowledge check, which you can take here as part of the Care Certificate course. Attempts are unlimited and marking happens on our servers, so the answers are never sent to the browser.
Your employer's assessor must also observe you applying it in practice before this standard is complete. That is how the Care Certificate is designed, and it is the reason a purely online Care Certificate does not exist however it is advertised.
Questions about Standard 8
What are the early signs of dehydration in older people?
Thirst arrives late and unreliably in older age, so do not wait for it: look for dark or strong smelling urine, headaches, new confusion, dizziness on standing, dry mouth and skin that stays tented when gently pinched. New confusion in particular gets misread as dementia progressing when it is a fluid problem with a same day fix.