Last updated 5 March 2019
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection checked 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 12,13 and 16 November 2018. The first day was unannounced but the provider knew when we were returning to complete the inspection.

The inspection was undertaken by one adult social care inspector and an expert by experience. An expert by experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service. In this instance the expert by experience was living with a visual impairment and they joined us for the first day of the inspection.

Prior to the inspection we reviewed all the information we held about the home including notifications and information from the Local Authority and safeguarding team. We also reviewed information from a Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We used all this information to help us develop the plan we used for the inspection.

During the inspection we spoke with nine people who were living in the home and five of their relatives. We spoke with 11 staff including staff from the consultancy company, the registered manager and deputy and both senior carers and carers who worked both days and nights at the home.

We also spoke with the home’s GP who completed weekly surgeries at the home.

We looked in detail at eight care plans and reviewed more for specific information. We looked at the records used to manage and administer medicines, records from the kitchen and management information used to monitor provision and support service delivery.

We used the Short Observational Framework for Inspection (SOFI). SOFI is a way of observing care to help us understand the experience of people who could not talk with us.

We looked around all areas of the home including the communal areas, people’s bedrooms and the kitchen and laundry.