St Catherine's Care Home Also known as St Catherine's Nursing Home

Updated 3 March 2020

The inspection

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

Inspection team

One inspector and one Expert by Experience completed the inspection. An Expert by Experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

Service and service type

St Catherine’s Care Home is a 'care home'. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care as a single package under one contractual agreement. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided. The registered manager was off work at the time of inspection. Another manager supported the inspection. The provider intended for them to take over the running of the service and they were in the process of applying to be registered with CQC at the time of inspection.

Notice of inspection

The inspection was unannounced.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed all the information we held about the service, including notifications of changes, events or incidents that the provider is legally obliged to send us within the required timescales. We contacted professionals in local authority commissioning teams and safeguarding teams. We reviewed the service’s previous inspection reports.

The provider was not asked to complete a provider information return prior to this inspection. This is information we require providers to send us to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We took this into account when we inspected the service and made the judgements in this report. We used all of this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with 12 people who used the service and six relatives. We observed interactions between staff and people who used the service. We spoke with nine members of staff: the manager, nominated individual, area manager, relationships manager and a range of care staff including the senior carer.

We looked at three people's care plans, risk assessments and medicines records. We reviewed staff training information, quality assurance systems, a selection of the home's policies and procedures, meeting minutes and maintenance records.

Following the inspection

We contacted two further health and social care professionals.

Updated 3 March 2020

About the service

St Catherine’s Care Home provides nursing and personal care for a maximum of 47 older people on one floor in one purpose built building. At the time of our inspection visit there were 44 people using the service, the majority of whom were living with a dementia.

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

People felt safe, well looked after and loved. They felt the service was a place they could call ‘home’ and in which they were comfortable. Staff responded to people's individualities with a passionate and creative approach to enabling their independence. People were supported to play a full role in the running of the service, if they wanted, and an enjoyment of the things that made them unique. People’s religious beliefs were respected and celebrated.

Staff ensured there was a relaxed, affectionate and highly respectful atmosphere in which people’s individualities were respected and celebrated.

All staff demonstrated an understanding of the provider’s ethos of providing person-centred care and meeting the individual needs, wants and wishes of each person.

Systems and processes supported the open and accountable culture.

Staff were well trained, skilled and knowledgeable. They received the right support to do their jobs and ongoing encouragement to ensure they found time to chat with people on a one to one basis.

Activities and community involvement were varied and vibrant.

Medicines, the premises, utilities and safety equipment were all managed safely. The recent moved to electronic medicines and care documentation had been managed well. There was a proactive culture of analysing incidents and learning from them.

Feedback about the manager and staff was consistently positive from people, relatives and external professionals. Oversight of all aspects of the service was strong. There were clear plans and opportunities for continual service improvement through external engagement work and specialist-led dementia friendly reviews of the premises and end of life care.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible. The policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

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

Rating at last inspection

The last rating for this service was good (published 10 June 2017).

Why we inspected

This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.

Follow up

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