Beechcroft

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.

This is the first assessment for this newly registered service. This key question has been rated requires improvement. This meant people did not always feel well-supported, cared for or treated with dignity and respect.

The service was in breach of legal regulation in relation to person centred care.

This service scored 60 (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 always treated people with kindness, empathy and compassion and respected their privacy and dignity. Staff treated colleagues from other organisations with kindness and respect.

Staff knew people well and treated them with kindness. We saw warm relationships between staff and people. One person told us, “I’ve been here a long time now, the staff take good care of me”. We received positive feedback form people’s relatives. One relative said, “They are absolutely wonderful, they care for [relative] so well”. A second relative said, “The staff are very caring and keep [relative] comfortable. I feel staff know them well” and a third relative told us, “I think [the staff] are very good, they look after them well”.

The provider did not always treat people as individuals or make sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. They did not always take account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics.

People’s care plans did not always contain enough information to help staff to support them, particularly where they were unable to communicate their needs themselves due to living with dementia. For example, several people experienced regular emotional distress, their care plans said staff should offer them ‘reassurance’, but there was no guidance as to what that might look like for that individual person.

People’s care plans contained limited information about their likes and dislikes, or how they liked to spend their time.

The provider did not always promote people’s independence, so people did not always know their rights and have choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing.

People had limited choice over the structure and routine of their care and had limited independence. There were a variety of group activities taking place on a regular basis. However, it was not evident through people’s care planning their individual skills and interests were at the centre of the care they received. Some people told us they felt unstimulated. For example, one person said, “I can’t explain it, but I feel locked up, I feel cut off from the community”.

The provider did not always listen to and understand people’s needs, views and wishes. Staff did not always respond to people’s needs in the moment or act to minimise any discomfort, concern or distress.

Records showed significant numbers of instances of people experiencing emotional distress. This included people walking around the home and entering each other’s rooms. Whilst staff supported people to remain safe, there was limited evidence they understood why the people were distressed or what their underlying needs were. For example, staff routinely diverted people back to their own bedrooms or communal areas but hadn’t explored what the person had wanted or given them an alternative task to divert their attention. This meant people were repeating the same behaviours. Over 200 instances of people being ‘found’ in various areas of the home were recorded in a 2 month period, and no analysis was completed to identify where people’s experiences could be improved.

The provider cared about and promoted the wellbeing of their staff, and supported and enabled staff to always deliver person-centred care.

Staff told us they enjoyed working at the service and felt well supported. Comments included; “The environment is positive, and the team is supportive. Everyone works together to make sure residents receive the best possible care”, “It's a caring and supportive environment where staff work together to provide the best possible care for residence. Every day is different and it's fulfilling to know that we are making a real difference in people's lives”, “Staff are treated fairly and encouraged to develop their skills and responsibilities” and “I can say in all honesty that this is one of the best places I have worked”.