Harmony House

Updated 21 June 2023

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 Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by 1 inspector.

Service and service type

Harmony House is registered with CQC as a ‘care home’ and CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided. Both were looked at during this inspection.

Registered Manager

This service is required to have a registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.

At the time of our inspection, the home did not have a registered manager in post.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was unannounced and we visited the home on 3 May 2023.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority who work with the service. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return (PIR). This is information providers are required to send us annually with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. We used all this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with 3 people who used service and 3 relatives about their experience of the care provided. We spoke with 3 members of staff including the acting home manager.

We reviewed a range of records. This included care plans, recruitment information, staff training records and records associated with the provider's quality monitoring systems.

Updated 21 June 2023

About the service

Harmony House is a care home in Salford which is registered with CQC to provide care for a maximum of 12 people. There were 9 people using the service at the time of the inspection.

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

At our last inspection in April 2022 we identified concerns regarding the safe management of medication (particularly storage), infection control procedures relating to COVID-19, the environment and governance systems. We found some of these concerns had now been addressed.

Although we found some improvements had been made, appropriate action had not been taken to ensure the environment was properly maintained. A registered manager had not been in post for over 6 months which is a requirement of the home’s registration.

There were enough staff to care for people safely and correct staff recruitment procedures were followed. Staff understood about safeguarding and how to report concerns.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

There were systems in place to seek feedback from people living at the home, including the use of satisfaction surveys. Out of hours spot checks were also undertaken and staff supervisions held. Audits were carried out by both the provider and acting home manager.

Rating at last inspection

The last rating for this service was requires improvement (published May 2022) and the provider was in breach of regulations relating to good governance and safe care and treatment. The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve. At this inspection, not enough improvement had been made and the provider was still in breach of certain regulations.

Why we inspected

We carried out a focused inspection of this service in April 2022. Breaches of regulations 12 and 17 were found. The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve.

We undertook this focused inspection to check they had followed their action plan and to confirm they now met legal requirements. This report only covers our findings in relation to the Key Questions Safe and Well-led which contain those requirements. For those key questions not inspected (Effective, Caring and Responsive) we used the ratings awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating. The overall rating for the service remains requires improvement. This is based on the findings at this inspection.

We looked at infection prevention and control measures under the Safe key question. We look at this in all care home inspections even if no concerns or risks have been identified. This is to provide assurance that the service can respond to COVID-19 and other infection outbreaks effectively.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the 'all reports' link for Harmony House on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Recommendations:

We have made a recommendation that the provider continues to monitor the quality of the environment to ensure improvements continue and are sustained.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect. For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk