Freckleton Lodge

Updated 26 February 2022

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.

As part of CQC’s response to care homes with outbreaks of COVID-19, we are conducting reviews to ensure that the Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) practice is safe and that services are compliant with IPC measures. This was a targeted inspection looking at the IPC practices the provider has in place. We also asked the provider about any staffing pressures the service was experiencing and whether this was having an impact on the service.

This inspection took place on 21 January 2022 and was unannounced.

Updated 26 February 2022

About the service

Freckleton Lodge is a care home providing personal care to 28 older people at the time of our inspection. The service can support up to 28 older and younger adults who may be living with dementia. Bedrooms are of single occupancy with ensuite facilities, with various communal spaces for people’s comfort.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

The registered manager and staff had an exceptional understanding of supporting people safely during the current pandemic. A staff member said, “We’re so clued up. It’s become second nature now, which keeps us all safe.” Staff demonstrated a good awareness of protecting people from harm or abuse. They were patient and responded to people’s needs quickly. Staff followed correct procedures to ensure people received their medicines safely and as prescribed

The Management team provided multiple opportunities to assist people, visitors and staff to feed back their experiences of living and working at the home. They had extensive auditing systems to maintain ongoing oversight of the home. Staff said they worked well as a team and people commented the home was well managed.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection and update

The last rating for this service was good (published 05 September 2019).

Why we inspected

We wanted to assure ourselves the service remained safe since our last inspection and continued to be led well under the newly registered manager.

We looked at infection prevention and control measures under the safe key question. We look at this in all care home inspections even if no concerns or risks have been identified. This is to provide assurance that the service can respond to coronavirus and other infection outbreaks effectively.

We reviewed the information we held about the service. No areas of concern were identified in the other key questions. We therefore did not inspect them. Ratings from previous comprehensive inspections for those key questions were used in calculating the overall rating at this inspection.

We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at risk of harm from this concern. Please see the safe and well-led sections of this full report.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Freckleton Lodge on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service until we return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.