The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has told Marsh House in Leyland, Lancashire that it must make improvements to protect the safety and welfare of people living there.
CQC carried out an unannounced inspection at the home in February this year as part of its inspection program for 2016/17, and inspectors found that the provider had failed to provider services that were safe, effective, caring, responsive to people’s needs and services that were well led.
Overall, Marsh House has been rated Inadequate and has been placed into special measures.
A previous inspection in November 2014 rated the service Requires Improvement overall, inspectors returned to the service and found that the provider could not evidence any significant improvements and could not demonstrate any robust systems to ensure the service was delivering high quality care. Staff did not always know how to keep people safe or how to recognise safeguarding concerns, and the provider did not appear to be effectively dealing with complaints – concerns had been raised but little or no action resulted from the complaint being raised. The provider was not employing a robust system to record accidents and incidents, and therefore could not mitigate any risk in future or prevent reoccurrence. Medicine management in the home was poor – the provider had failed to ensure medication was available at all times and one person’s medication had run out over a weekend, inspectors found errors and omissions regarding the medication procedures in the home. Management were generally unaware of the residents health needs and were not providing staff with effective training and supervision to ensure they had the necessary skills to appropriately care for the people in the home.
Debbie Westhead, Deputy Chief Inspector of Adult Social Care in the North, said:
“It is extremely disappointing that the provider has not taken the findings of our inspection in 2014 seriously and failed to make the required improvements to ensure the people living in Marsh House are well cared for.
“People are entitled to services which provide safe, effective, compassionate and high quality care and we have told the provider that the lack of identifiable improvement is unacceptable.
“We have been working with Lancashire County Council to ensure that people living at the home are not at undue risk. We will continue to monitor this care home. The service has been placed into special measures – and we are considering taking enforcement action and will report on this action when it is completed.”
Any regulatory decision that CQC takes is open to challenge by a registered provider/person through a variety of internal and external appeal processes.
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For further information please contact CQC Regional Communications Officer Mark Humphreys on 0191 233 3519 or 07881656012. Journalists wishing to speak to the press office outside of office hours can find out how to contact the team here. Please note: the press office is unable to advise members of the public on health or social care matters. For general enquiries, please call 03000 61 61 61.
Find out more
Read our reports about Marsh House.