Archived: Knowsley Road

Updated 13 April 2015

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

This inspection took place on 12 January 2015 and was unannounced. It was carried out by a team of three people; a lead Adult Social Care inspector, a second Adult Social Care inspector and a specialist advisor, who was a registered nurse.

We viewed the current information we held on our systems. The provider had sent us an action plan after the last inspection. We reviewed notifications made to us by the service. We received information from the Local Authority and from the local Healthwatch. Healthwatch is an independent consumer champion that gathers and represents the views of the public about health and social care services in England.

We observed the care of the people living in Knowsley Road; spoke with nine people, six care staff, the two managers of the service and with one visiting health and social care professional. The provider held most of the information about the home electronically. We reviewed five staff files and case tracked three people with their care records. We reviewed other records, including audits, the training matrix and various policies, many of which the provider emailed to us after the inspection.

Updated 13 April 2015

This unannounced inspection took place on 12 January 2015. At our last inspection, on 16 January 2014 we had found there was a breach of Regulation 22 Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010, regarding staffing numbers and training. The provider sent us an action plan to tell us that this would be addressed by 01June 2014. We found on this inspection that the breach had been dealt with.

The home required a registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run. At the time of this inspection, the registered manager was away on leave and the service was being run by one of the providers who was the also the registered manager at another of their homes, with the support of the provider’s health service manager.

The service was registered to provide care for 24 people and at the time of our inspection, there were 15 people resident although one of these was in hospital. The people supported by the service all had mental health needs and some had additional physical needs.

The home was in a pair of adapted, semi-detached Victorian houses. The building was dark and cold in places.

We found that people were happy and felt safe but they complained of being cold. Their dignity and privacy were not respected as staff entered rooms sometimes without knocking. People were not given a choice about many of the aspects of their daily life such as when to have a snack. Staff were supported and trained but they were not conversant with the Mental Capacity Act (2005) or the associated Deprivation of Liberties Safeguards. The management style was not appropriate to the people being supported and the way the home was run did not allow people to live their lives freely or independently.

We found a number of breaches of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010 which corresponded to regulations in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014.. You can see what action we told the provider to take at the back of the full version the report.