Rush Court

Rush Court is residential care home providing personal and nursing care for up to 40 people aged 65 and over. At the time of the inspection there were 39 people using the service.

Rush Court provides support to people over two floors. One floor specialises in nursing care.

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

People felt safe living at Rush Court. People were supported by sufficient staff who knew how to report all concerns relating to harm and abuse. There were effective systems in place to assess and manage risks. Medicines were managed safely and people received their medicines as prescribed.

Staff had the skills and knowledge to meet people’s needs and were supported in their role. People were supported to access health care professionals when required. People were complimentary about the food and were supported to ensure their dietary needs were met.

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

People told us staff were kind and caring. Staff treated people with dignity and respect, valuing them as individuals. People were involved in all decisions about their care and choices were respected.

Care plans were not always person-centred. This had been identified by the registered manager and there were plans in place to update and improve care plans. People were confident to raise concerns. All concerns were investigated, and action taken to resolve any identified areas of improvement. People were supported to remain at Rush Court for end of life care if this was their wish and were treated with dignity.

There was a person-centred culture that ensured people were at the centre of all the service did. There was a new registered manager in post who had identified areas for improvement. There were clear plans in place to ensure the improvements were achieved. Staff enjoyed working at the service and were committed to providing high-quality care.

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 outstanding (published 23 August 2017).

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.

At our inspection in June 2015 we found that medicines were not always managed safely. At this inspection we found improvements had been made and people received their medicines safely.

There was a strong caring culture that created a family feel to the service. The registered manager promoted a person-centred culture that ensured everything the service did benefited the people who lived there. People and relatives were complimentary about the responsiveness and approachability of the registered manager. Staff were passionate about their work and were supported by the management team within the service.

Without exception people and their relatives were extremely positive about the quality of care people received and described many examples of staff going the extra mile when supporting people. People received compassionate care that put them at the centre of everything the service did. People developed relationships with staff based on mutual respect and kindness. There were many caring interactions where staff showed they knew people well and valued people as individuals.

People had the opportunity to engage in activities that took into account their individual interests. People were encouraged to continue to enjoy past interests and to re-establish skills they had not used for sometime. People had close links with the community and enjoyed regular outings to local places of interests. When people's needs changed the service took immediate action to ensure their needs were met.

The service supported people at the end of their life and did so with empathy, ensuring people experienced a dignified, pain free death. Staff supported bereaved families with compassion and carried out acts of kindness to reduce their distress.

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 support this practice.

There were effective systems in place that ensured the registered manager had an overview of the quality of the service and enabled continuous improvement.

The registered manager looked for innovative ways to improve the service. The service benefitted from membership of nationally recognised schemes that promoted high quality care and respected people as individuals. People were involved in the development of the service. The registered manager ensured learning from complaints and feedback from people was used to improve the service.

The registered manager ensured they kept their skills and knowledge up to date and looked for ways to share learning throughout the organisation.

We were told by one person that "we do lots of lovely things" and we saw the provider made a variety of activities available for people. We found the provider was providing personalised care, treatment and support and that peoples individual needs were

assessed with appropriate plans being drawn up and implemented.

There was guidance in the home on safeguarding people from abuse. Staff members spoken to knew how to report any concerns regarding abuse. People we spoke told told us they would be able to speak up if they were unhappy with the way they were cared for. We found the provider was protecting people from the risk of abuse.

We found by looking at staff rotas and training records and speaking with the provider that there was sufficient qualified, skilled and experienced staff to provide care and support for people.

There was an improvement plan in place and we saw the provider was seeking the views of family representatives and making changes as a result. We found the provider was investigating comments and complaints and accidents and incidents and was learning from these in order to improve the care, treatment and support provided to people.

People had access to a range of social activities, events, outings, and their spiritual needs were also provided for.

Appropriate arrangements were in place to manage people's medication and people who were able, could choose to manage this for themselves.

Appropriate recruitment checks were carried out before new staff began work at the home, although induction records could be better documented.

The home had an appropriate complaints procedure and all complaints were investigated. Not all complaints in the previous 12 months had been resolved to people's satisfaction and some aspects of complaints recording were not sufficiently detailed. We saw that people had a range of other opportunities to discuss their opinions about the home and the care provided.