Westwood House

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 inspection we rated this key question outstanding. At this inspection 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.

People and their relatives described staff as “kind, caring and efficient”. One relative told us, “[The staff] deserve a medal.” Another relative told us, “The staff are very friendly, when we go and visit, they offer tea and coffee and biscuits. [The staff are] very friendly and helpful.” We observed staff treating people with kindness, compassion and dignity during our site visit.

The provider treated people as individuals and made sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. They took account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics. People’s care plans contained information about people’s social, cultural and religious preferences. Staff knew people well and their preferences. People had individual goals and aspirations recorded within their care plans.

The provider promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing. We observed staff offering people choices during our site visit. People told us they were able to make choices. People were involved in choosing which meals featured on their weekly menu and were involved in the activity timetables. One relative told us “[Person] is encouraged to pick his clothes”. Staff told us they felt people had freedom to make their own choices. People’s independence was promoted, and choices were documented within records of people’s care.

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. We observed staff responding to people’s needs in a timely manner. People told us staff came quickly when they needed support. Where people could not communicate verbally, we observed interactions between staff and people that demonstrated relationships were caring and compassionate, enabling staff to anticipate and meet people’s needs quickly and in ways that reduced and mitigated people’s discomfort and distress.

Staff told us that during recent times they had not felt supported by leaders during a time where there were a higher number of incidents at the service. One staff member told us, “That time was really distressing. We feel we were not that supported, [leaders were] telling us to do this and that, but they weren’t looking at our needs.” Another staff member told us, “I don’t think upper management realised how bad it was until they finally saw it for themselves, and they realised what staff and other people we support went through in their daily lives really. But that’s the only time we weren’t supported as much as we should have been. But without seeing it for themselves, I don’t think they realised how bad it was.”

The operations manager told us; “I feel I did as much as I could. I went into [the service] a lot more. We did clinics to support staff. I was always on the phone, or on teams to support staff.”

Other staff told us they felt supported generally. One staff member gave a personal example of how they had been supported by leaders.