Orchard Lodge Care Home, Blackpool, is rated as Inadequate by the Care Quality Commission

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has told Dharma Limited that it must make urgent improvements at Orchard Lodge Care Home on Lytham Road, Blackpool, Lancashire, or face enforcement action.

During an unannounced inspection in November 2014, inspectors found that the home, in Lytham Road, was failing to provide care which was safe, effective, caring, responsive to people’s needs or well led.

Under CQC’s new programme of inspections, all adult social care services are being given a rating to help people choose care. Overall, Orchard Lodge has been rated as Inadequate.

A full report from the inspection has been published on the CQC website: www.cqc.org.uk/location/1-129581345.

Following the inspection, CQC issued seven warning notices requiring Dharma Limited to protect the health, safety and welfare of the residents. The report identifies a number of areas in which improvements were needed, including:

• Inspectors found that people living in the home were not kept safe due to poor medicines management.
• There were not always enough suitably qualified staff on duty to make sure that people’s needs were met. Call bells were not answered in a timely manner and people living at the home told inspectors they often had to wait to have their needs met because staff were so busy.
• Some areas of the home were dirty and unhygienic and door closures were positioned in a way that put people at risk from injury.
• Risks to people who received care were not always safely managed. For example, there were limited or no recorded risk assessments in place and accidents and incidents were not followed up to minimise their re-occurrence.
• Care was not always delivered according to people’s care plans. Care plans contained missing information and where an individual’s needs had changed this was not always reflected in the care given.
• Staff told us they were adequately trained and received formal and informal supervision. However, we were unable to fully confirm this because related staff records were poorly maintained and indicated staff had received only minimal training.
• People’s privacy was not always respected, and restrictions were placed on people which did not take into account individual capacity. For example, sliding bolts were in place on the outside of bedroom doors and bed rails were widely used throughout the home.
• Quality monitoring processes were ineffective and the home’s gas and electric safety certification were out of date.

Debbie Westhead, Deputy Chief Inspector of Adult Social Care in the North, said:

“It is unacceptable that the people living at Orchard Lodge Care Home were not being provided with good quality, consistent and reliable care and we have made it clear to the provider that action must be taken to resolve the issues we identified.

“While we did see some caring interactions between staff and people living in the home, and that in some ways people were well supported, the safety issues we identified needed urgent attention.

“We are liaising closely with Blackpool Council to safeguard the wellbeing of everyone who lives at the home and we continue to monitor this provider very carefully to check that the required improvements are made.

“We will return in due course to check on progress and should we find the necessary improvements have not been implemented we will take further action.”

Ends

For further information please contact CQC Regional Engagement Manager Kirstin Hannaford on 0191 233 3629. Alternatively, the CQC press office can be contacted on 0207 448 9401 or out of hours on 07789 876508.