Primrose 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 good. At this assessment the rating has changed to requires improvement. This meant people did not always feel well-supported, cared for or treated with dignity and respect. A breach was identified at this inspection in relation to person-centred care and the provision of activities in line with people’s needs and preferences.

This service scored 55 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

People were treated with kindness, empathy and compassion, staff respected their privacy and dignity. Staff treated colleagues with kindness and respect.

Comments from people included, “The staff are excellent, they are kind and respectful, sometimes it takes a while for the call bell to be answered.”

A relative said, “Staff are very nice. It’s a good group of staff who are fine. They laugh and joke with [person]. They are not pushy or abrupt. Very pleasant people.” Another relative said, “[Person] has a very short fuse and shouts and swears. They (staff) are very tolerant of him and very kind. They sang to him on his birthday and brought him a cake. Nice and pleasant staff who keep us updated.”

Staff treated people as individuals and made sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. They took account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics.

People’s preferences around the gender of staff who cared for them was respected. Staff understood people’s specific communication needs, however specific activities preferences were not always accommodated.

The provider did not support people with activities in line with their needs and preferences, and did not always promote people’s independence, so people did not know their rights and have choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing.

There was lack of meaningful group and individual activities available to people. Although the service employed an activities coordinator, they were only available for a very limited amount of time each week. During the inspection the advertised activities did not always take place. Staff told us there was not enough time to support all the people in the service with meaningful activities. Comments from relatives included, “There were activities but they seem to be suspended. They used to have entertainers and singers. I’ve not seen them this year,” “Nothing going on at the moment,” and “You don't see the activity person up on first floor, I have not seen any activities going on, I haven't met an activities person.”

A healthcare partner explained that there were negative impacts for the people who chose to stay in their rooms, when staff only provided transactional care rather than meaningful one to one activities or conversations.

The provider did not always listen to and understand people’s needs, views and wishes. Staff did not always respond to people’s needs in the moment or act to minimise any discomfort, concern or distress.

There had been issues where the call bell system did not always work as expected, the provider was in the process of replacing this system. People gave mixed feedback about staff member’s ability to support them in a timely manner. Comments included, “[The service could do with a few more staff. When the buzzer goes they could be a bit quicker. [Person] has said it can be a wait. Maybe 15 minutes on average,” and, “They’re a little bit short of staff. You have to wait a bit. [Staff] could be a bit quicker when [person] needs the toilet.”

The provider did not always care about and promote the wellbeing of their staff. They did not always support or enable staff to deliver person-centred care. Managers held regular supervisions and team meetings to support staff although some supervisions were overdue. Feedback from staff was mixed, some staff felt there was a disparity in support depending on which department they worked in. One staff member explained they had raised concerns but limited action had been taken and this had impacted on their wellbeing.