Archived: Hilltop Hall Nursing Home

Updated 6 February 2025

Dates of assessment 24/02/2025 to 27/03/2025

Hilltop Hall Nursing Home is a care home providing personal and nursing care to up to 54 people and at the time of our site visit was supporting 26 people. The assessment was undertaken to follow up on enforcement action initiated at our last inspection and to see whether the service had made the necessary improvements and was now compliant with the regulations. We found the provider had not taken the action needed to meet the breaches of regulations identified at the last inspection. People did not receive personalised care in line with their assessed needs; consent was not suitably obtained and in line with the requirements of the Mental Capacity Act; medicines were not safely managed; risk was not suitably assessed and mitigated; there were insufficient staff available to meet people’s needs; and the systems for governance and oversight were ineffective. Additional concerns were raised in how people were safely supported to eat and drink which had also been identified at a previous inspection. The service continued to be in breach of five regulations with one new breach of regulation. Improvements to recruitment processes had been addressed and the provider was no longer in breach of this regulation.

Following our last inspection of the service we took enforcement action to vary the conditions of the provider’s registration with CQC, so that they are no longer able to deliver the regulated activity from this location. During the production of this report, the Registered Provider took the decision to close the home and withdraw their ongoing appeal against our enforcement action. Therefore, our enforcement action to vary the provider’s registration as described above has taken effect and the provider is now no longer registered to provide a regulated activity from this location.

Updated 6 February 2025

People generally spoke positively of how they were cared for by staff. One person told us, “I am not frightened and I feel well support by the staff. The staff understand me and communication is good and I have no worries. The staff know what they are doing.” However, this was not reflected in our observations of how care was provided or within the records maintained by staff.

People and families felt their care needs were met but were not able to tell us how personalised care was consistently delivered. One family member commented, “My [family member] likes to go out in the garden but this isn’t always possible as they do not have enough bucket chairs.”

Comments about the food varied with one person commenting, “I think the food is ok, most of the time and you get a choice. The other day I did not eat my tea. I asked the staff for a toasted teacake which was good.” Another person commented, “The food is not bad, and you normally get a choice. Sometimes I feel hungry, depending on which staff are on I get more, whilst others tell me I have had enough to eat.”

People told us staff were respectful and would knock on the door before entering the bedrooms and seek consent before providing support. However, this was not reflected in our observations of how people were supported.

We observed people did not always have their needs met in a timely way and risks were not always effectively mitigated particularly in relation to how people were supported with their moving and handling needs. People did not always have access to fluids or ways to summon staff assistance when they needed.

We did note some staff were very task focused and busy, but some staff made time to engage and provide kind and compassionate care to people.