Stonedale Lodge Care Home

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 assessment we rated this key question inadequate. At this assessment the remained the same. This meant people were not treated with compassion and there were breaches of dignity and respect; staff caring attitudes had significant shortfalls.

The provider was in breach of the legal regulation in relation to dignity and respect.

The provider was previously in breach of the legal regulation in relation to person centred care. Enough improvements were found at this assessment, and the provider was no longer in breach of this regulation.

This service scored 35 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

Staff did not always treat people with kindness, empathy and compassion, or respect their privacy and dignity. For example, underwear supplied with people’s prescribed incontinence pads (net fixation pants designed to securely hold incontinence pads) were referred to by staff as ‘netty knickers.’ The pants were not labelled to identify who they belonged to and after laundering they were stored together in a box and used for people as and when they required them.

People’s personal possessions held in a safe including items of jewellery and mobile telephones were mixed up together in bags with no information identifying who they belonged to. It was not possible to establish whether the items belonged to people still living at the home or if arrangements had been made for family members to take possession of them.

This was a breach of Regulation 10.

The provider did not always treat people as individuals. For example, toiletry items held in some people’s bedrooms did not belong to them. Items were labelled with other people’s initials. Staff confirmed some people were provided with items of clothing passed on from family members of people who no longer lived at the home. There was no evidence to show this had been agreed with the person or anyone acting on their behalf. A family member told us their relative often had clothing in their wardrobe belonging to other people and another family member told us their relatives clothing often went missing.

The provider did not always promote people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing. For example, some people did not have a remote control to enable them to operate their televisions independently. A staff member told us people were given TVs from other rooms without a remote control and relied on staff to operate them manually because this was difficult for them to do independently. People were unable to access gardens due them being unsafe. A staff member said, “We don’t take people out in the garden they’re not safe or nice” and “Gardens used to be lovely with all nice furniture but are awful now.” A family member told us, “[Relative] loves the sun and likes sitting in the garden, but it's such a state.”

There was a limited choice of meaningful and stimulating activities for people. Staff felt there was a lack of activities available at the home, their comments included, “One thing we definitely need is more activities,” “Only have 1 activities co-ordinator across all 3 units” and “Staff try as best we can when we have time to do things with the residents, sing song, bingo etc would love to be able to go on day trips.” One person said, “I'm bored rigid in this room, I have a wheelchair, but I need someone to take me out in it, I'd love to go to out, but I don't go anywhere.”

However, people were supported to maintain important relationships with family and friends. People had a choice of where they spent time with their visitors. Family members told us they could visit at any time.

The provider listened to and understood people’s needs, views and wishes. For example, we observed staff quickly responding to people’s requests and providing people with the support they needed to eat and drink.

One person however told us, “I press this bell, and they come, and they turn the bell off and then they go away and sometimes don't come back for a while, so what’s the point in pressing the bell.” A family member told us, “They don't toilet [relative] often enough. I take [relative] as soon as I arrive and [relative] always needs to go.”

The provider did not always promote the wellbeing of their staff, and support and enable staff to always deliver person-centred care. For example, staff had not always received formal supervision to discuss their work, performance, wellbeing, learning and development. Staff felt uncertain and anxious about their future employment at the home. They had been made aware of future changes to the service including the closure of a unit but felt they had not been kept fully informed impacting on their wellbeing. Their comments included, “No information on changes, 6 weeks ago HR [Human resources] manager came in and said the unit was closing next week, that timescale has passed, it’s worrying me,” “Now heard from relatives and not managers when it will happen” and “Just wish management would be open and honest about what, how, when."