Meridan House

On this page

• Overview
• Shared direction and culture
• Capable, compassionate and inclusive leaders
• Freedom to speak up
• Workforce equality, diversity and inclusion
• Governance, management and sustainability
• Partnerships and communities
• Learning, improvement and innovation

Well-led – this means we looked for evidence that leadership, management and governance assured high-quality, person-centred care; supported learning and innovation; and promoted an open, fair culture.

This was the first assessment for this newly registered service after the provider made changes to their registration. This key question has been rated requires improvement. This meant the management and leadership was inconsistent. Leaders and the culture they created did not always support the delivery of high-quality, person-centred care.

The provider was in breach of legal regulation in relation to the governance of the service.

This service scored 57 (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 did not always have a clear shared vision, strategy and culture when something went wrong. They did not always understand the challenges and the needs of people and their communities to assure them the service is managed in a safe way.

In many ways there was a positive and shared culture. The registered manager, managers, and staff were supportive and kind to people. They understood the person’s right to make their own choices about their life, and their role to check they were happy. However, further work was needed for the provider and registered manager to have a shared direction about responding to events which could affect people’s safety.

There were capable and compassionate leaders at the service. But leaders did not always have the skills, knowledge, and experience to lead effectively.

There was capable leadership of the home in many ways. However, the registered manager and provider had not led effectively to ensure lessons had been learnt following a known event affecting the ‘service’. The provider and registered manager had not prioritised this matter to robustly ensure all necessary work had been completed to promote people’s safety and assure all professionals involved.

The registered manager and provider fostered a positive culture where people felt they could speak up and their voice would be heard.

Staff were confident about speaking up and approaching their manager and the provider if they felt this was important. One member of staff talked us through how they had done this.

The provider valued diversity in their workforce. They worked towards an inclusive and fair culture by improving equality and equity for people who worked for them.

There was a diverse workforce. Staff said they felt supported to develop their interest and understanding of mental health needs. One member of staff spoke about the additional training the provider had offered staff to better understand the complexities of mental health conditions.

The provider did not always have clear responsibilities, roles, systems of accountability or good governance. They did not act on the best information about risk, performance and outcomes, or share this securely with others when appropriate.

The provider had failed to assess the safety of an aspect of the service despite this coming under focus and scrutiny following an event. They had failed to look at what they and the registered manager had done as a result and to assess how effective this was. The actions they had eventually taken were not timely and were part promoted by this assessment. The provider’s oversight of this issue was not effective. There were shortfalls in their understanding and knowledge of their regulatory role.

The provider had some effective processes to assess the quality of the care provided. They undertook environmental safety checks, IPC audits, audits into the practice of staff and the quality of people’s care plans and risk assessments. However, some of these audits were not always effective.The provider had not identified the IPC issues we had, and the shortfalls in a person’s risk assessments and monitoring records. When other auditing was taking place, the evidence was not always effectively captured for example staff practice in the kitchen. The oversight regarding work completed following a fire assessment was not complete and according to the provider’s instructions.

This meant the provider had placed people at potential risk of harm. The provider was therefore in breach of the legal regulation of good governance.

The provider did understand their duty to collaborate and work in partnership, so services worked seamlessly for people. But they did not always share information and learning with partners or collaborate for improvement, effectively.

The provider did seek the input from the mental health trust and social services. However, they did not always do this in a timely and effective way.

The provider did not always focus on continuous learning, innovation and improvement across the organisation and local system. They did not always encourage creative ways of delivering equality of experience, outcome and quality of life for people.

The provider had not taken timely action to confirm the new actions and revised existing processes, were effective following a known event some time ago. They had not checked staff had received the appropriate training and briefing of what they must do regarding this matter and if they were competent in this task. They had also not checked effectively any associated processes were being implemented correctly and evidenced effectively to assure themselves and other professionals involved in this home.