Archived: Belmont House Care Home Ltd

Updated 12 August 2017

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

This inspection took place on 27 June 2017 and was unannounced.

Prior to our inspection, we reviewed information we held about the service, including notifications sent to us at the Care Quality Commission. We looked at the information sent to us by the provider in the Provider Information Return. This is a form that asks the provider to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make.

The inspection was carried out by one inspector and one expert-by-experience. An expert-by-experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

We spoke with the registered manager and two members of the care staff. We spoke with three people living at the service, and spent some time watching interactions between staff and people living at the service. We contacted three health and social care professionals to gain their views on the care provided by the service. Only one relative responded to our request for feedback.

We looked at two recruitment files for staff, four supervision records and training records for the staff team. We looked at four care records for people living at the service. We looked at accidents and incidents. We checked records for essential facilities such as gas, electricity and the fire alarm systems. We looked at staff and residents’ meeting minutes and audits carried out by the registered manager.

Following the inspection visit the registered manager and new additional manager provided us with further information, and updated us on their intentions to progress some issues identified at the inspection.

Updated 12 August 2017

We inspected this service on 27 June 2017. The inspection was unannounced. We last inspected the home on 5 July 2016 and found three breaches of the regulations. These related to the safe management of medicines, treating people with dignity and respect and the governance of the service.

Belmont House Care Home Limited is registered to provide residential care for up to nine people with mental health needs. At the time of the inspection there were nine people living at the service. The service had a registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

People told us they were happy with the service and we saw staff were kind and caring.

We could see from records that staff recruitment was safe. References were in place and Disclosure and Barring Service checks had taken place prior to people being employed. This meant staff were considered safe to work with vulnerable adults.

There were improvements in the way that medicines were managed since the last inspection, but the systems in use were not effective in reconciling all stocks with records.

Staff were able to tell us what they would do if they had any concerns about safeguarding adults from abuse, and there were policies and procedures in place.

Staff told us they were supported well and we saw evidence of staff supervision. Staff were undertaking refresher training at the time of the inspection.

Care plans were comprehensive and covered a broad range of needs and the majority of risk assessments provided advice to staff on how to manage risks identified.

At this inspection the service was clean throughout and food was sealed and labelled appropriately. There was a programme of decorating underway and a health and social care professional told us the lighting at the service had been improved recently.

The Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA) provides a legal framework for making particular decisions on behalf of people who may lack the mental capacity to do so for themselves. We found the service was working within the principles of the MCA. At the last inspection we had noted the registered manager had not obtained consent to lock the front door from people at liberty to leave the service. The registered manager had undertaken to obtain consent. This had not been obtained at the time of this inspection but had been obtained at the time of writing this report.

Since the last inspection improvements have been made in relation to the management of the service, and so is no longer in breach of the regulation in relation to the governance of the service. For example, there were audits taking place to check the environment for both damage and cleanliness, and medicines management had improved. However, there were areas in which the management of the service required improvement. The registered manager was aware of this and had recruited additional management support to assist her.

We have made recommendations in relation to staff training, leisure activities and consideration of a safe smoking environment.