Court House Care Home

On this page

• Overview
• Kindness, compassion and dignity
• Treating people as individuals
• Independence, choice and control
• Responding to people’s immediate needs
• Workforce wellbeing and enablement

Caring – this means we looked for evidence that the provider involved people and treated them with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect.

At our last assessment we rated this key question requires improvement. At this assessment the rating has changed to good. This meant people were supported and treated with dignity and respect; and involved as partners in their care.

This service scored 70 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

The provider treated people with kindness, empathy and compassion and respected their privacy and dignity. Staff treated colleagues from other organisations with kindness and respect. Throughout the inspection staff were friendly and welcoming. We saw caring and meaningful interactions between staff, people and visitors. Staff sang and laughed with people and sat quietly and chatted with other people. The atmosphere was relaxed and calm.

All the visitors and relatives we spoke with praised the staff team for their kindness. They referred to staff as “Thoughtful”, “Caring” and “Kind and compassionate.” Relatives told us staff respected their loved one’s dignity. One relative told us, “I’m so grateful for this care home and what they have done for my relative”. Staff had completed training and understood how to promote dignity and compassion. One staff member said, “The manager is always encouraging us to think about how we would like our loved ones to be cared for if they were in a home and to make sure we provide kind care”.

The provider treated people as individuals and made sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. Staff took account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics.

In particular, the manager and clinical lead knew people well and could tell us about people’s life histories, including their previous jobs. We saw this information was included in care plans and staff told us they had access to these and took the time to read them when people moved to the service. Some staff told us they would also speak with people’s families and friends to find out more about them.

People were supported to maintain relationships with friends and family. Visitors were made to feel welcome. Activities took place during our time on site; we saw some activities were tailored to people’s individual preferences, but not all. For example, we saw one person loved to sing, and staff encouraged this and sang with them but not everyone chose to take part. The care plans we looked at did include some information for staff on how people liked to spend their time, such as knitting, or listening to specific music or talking about certain topics.

The provider promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing.

Care plans we looked at informed staff how much people could do for themselves and when they needed staff support. For example, when washing, some people could wash their face and arms but needed staff to wash their legs and back. This meant people were encouraged to maintain as much independence as possible. At lunchtime, we saw staff promoted people’s independence. We did see that staff were checking people were enjoying their meals, offering encouragement throughout the mealtime period and asking if people wanted more.

The provider listened to and understood people’s needs, views and wishes. Staff responded to people’s needs in the moment and acted to minimise any discomfort, concern or distress. Staff were visible throughout our time at the home. We saw staff responding to people’s needs and reassuring them when requests were made. Feedback from people and their relatives highlighted most people felt that had to wait for staff to become available and this wait might be more than 15 minutes. Comments included “Not many workers about”, “Don’t see anybody around” and “Can wait a long time”. To keep people living at the home safe, the management team had introduced a policy of staff allowing visitors into and out of the building rather than visitors having access to the door code to let themselves in. This meant some relatives experienced short delays before entering the home.

The provider cared about and promoted the wellbeing of their staff and supported and enabled staff to always deliver person-centred care. The manager shared with us how recent changes in the staffing team had been positive and the culture within the home was now much more person centred. The manager told us, “Caring work is very hard and not always given the recognition it deserves. The staff here put their soul into caring for people, and we are working together to move away from task centred care, and our staff team are embracing this change”. Staff told us they had confidence in the manager and found her responsive to their concerns.