The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has rated East Riding Care Home in Morpeth, Northumberland, inadequate and placed it in special measures following an inspection in September.
East Riding Care Home provides accommodation, personal and nursing care for up to 67 people, some of whom are living with a dementia related condition.
Following this inspection, the care home’s overall rating has dropped from requires improvement to inadequate. The service was also rated inadequate for being safe and well-led, and rated requires improvement for being caring, effective and responsive.
The service is now in special measures which means it will be kept under review, by CQC and re-inspected to check sufficient improvements have been made.
Alison Chilton, CQC head of inspection, said:
“When we inspected East Riding Care Home, we found a service where the standard of care had deteriorated since our last inspection. People’s needs weren’t always being met, staff weren’t being recruited safely and infection risks weren’t effectively managed.
“For example, both of the home’s washing machines had broken which had resulted in a large build-up of soiled laundry. The quantity and how it was stored increased the risk of infections being passed on to people and staff.
“Additionally, this resulted in some people not having enough clean clothes and having to wear other peoples. Also, staff told us they weren’t always able to change bedding as often due to the shortage of clean sheets, so people were living with dirty bed sheets which is totally unacceptable.
“We found staff weren’t recruited safely, we reviewed the recruitment files for three staff and found shortfalls with each one. In addition, out of the 28 agency staff that had worked in the home in August 2022, 19 hadn’t had appropriate checks to assess their suitability which could put people at risk.
“However, it was positive that people were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests. We received positive feedback from relatives regarding the caring attitudes of staff.
“We have told the provider what improvements need to be made to address the concerns identified. We will monitor the service closely and return to check on progress to make sure people are safe.”
Inspectors found:
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Safeguarding systems were not robust enough to ensure people were always protected from the risk of abuse.
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There were inaccuracies and omissions with the administration and recording of medicines.
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Agency staff were used to maintain safe staffing levels. However, this affected the ability of staff to provide a consistent service.
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An effective system to ensure that all notifications were submitted to the CQC in a timely manner was still not fully in place.
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Activities which were person-centred to the individual needs of people were not always provided.
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Some staff were not always using PPE effectively.
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We received feedback from some staff that there weren’t always food choices available to meet the needs of some people.
However:
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People were supported with their communication needs and advocacy services were used to support people where they required help to express their views.
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End of life care plans were in place to ensure any wishes people had for their end-of-life care were recorded.
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Procedures were in place to support visits in the home. People were supported to see their relatives to help promote their wellbeing.
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The provider told us they had developed actions plans in response to our inspection findings. The nominated individual told us they were confident in addressing the issues identified.