Archived: Nightingale House

Updated 6 July 2022

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. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by two inspectors.

Service and service type

Nightingale House is a 'care home'. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care as a single package under one contractual agreement. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

The service did not have a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. At the time of inspection, the deputy manager had taken on the role of manager and was being supported by a previous registered manager of the service.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was unannounced.

What we did before the inspection

We continued to receive information about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service who continued to raise concerns about the service and people living in it.

Updated 6 July 2022

About the service

Nightingale House is a care home. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care as single package under one contractual agreement. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

The care home accommodates 30 people over two floors in an older style adapted building. Twenty-one people were living in the service at the time of this inspection.

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

People living in the service were not safe and were at risk of harm. The environment continued to put people at risk, including from the risk of fire. Lessons were not learned, and improvements were not made when things went wrong. Recruitment checks were not robust and failed to keep people safe.

People continued to be restricted from freely moving around the service. People were not supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff did not support them in the least restrictive way possible.

The registered provider failed to provide assurance the service was well-led, that people were safe, and their care and support needs could be met. The registered provider failed to act on serious concerns raised at the last inspection and take immediate action.

The last rating for this service was inadequate (published 6 July 2020) The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve.

Why we inspected

The inspection was prompted following our last inspection of the service on 4 March 2020 where significant concerns were found. We did not receive assurances from the registered provider that enough actions were being taken to ensure people were safe and protected from harm. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those ongoing risks.

We therefore carried out a focused inspection to review the Key Questions of Safe and Well Led only.

We have identified continued breaches in relation to the environment, oversight, governance, dignity and respect. Following the inspection, all those living at the service were supported by Southend Borough Council to find alternative accommodation and care.

Special Measures

The overall rating for this service is ‘Inadequate’ and the service is therefore in ‘special measures’. This means we will keep the service under review and, if we do not propose to cancel the provider’s registration, we will re-inspect within 6 months to check for significant improvements.

If the provider has not made enough improvement within this timeframe and there is still a rating of inadequate for any key question or overall rating, we will act in line with our enforcement procedures. This will mean we will begin the process of preventing the provider from operating this service. This will usually lead to cancellation of their registration or to varying the conditions the registration. For adult social care services, the maximum time for being in special measures will usually be no more than 12 months. If the service has demonstrated improvements when we inspect it and it is no longer rated as inadequate for any of the five key questions, it will no longer be in special measures.