Archived: Greatwood House

Updated 10 September 2020

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

This was a targeted inspection looking at the infection control and prevention measures the provider has in place. As part of CQC’s response to the coronavirus pandemic we are conducting a thematic review of infection control and prevention measures in care homes.

This inspection took place on 19 August 2020 and was announced. The service was selected to take part in this thematic review which is seeking to identify examples of good practice in infection prevention and control.

Updated 10 September 2020

This inspection was carried out on 31 July and 2 August 2018 and was unannounced. We last inspected Greatwood House in January 2017 and identified three breaches of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014. Following the last inspection, we asked the provider to make improvements to their staffing levels at meal times, to ensure they were maintaining accurate and complete records in respect of people using the service and to ensure their quality systems were robust.

We asked the provider to complete an action plan to show what they would do and by when to improve the key questions of is the service safe, is the service responsive and is the service well led to at least good. At this inspection we found improvements had been made to these areas and the service was now meeting these regulations.

Greatwood House is a single storey building in the Haughton Green area of Denton in Greater Manchester. The home provides accommodation and support for up to 60 people who require personal care without nursing care. At the time of our inspection 46 people were living in the home. Greatwood House is owned and managed by HC-One.

At the time of our inspection there was a manager in post who had applied to the Care Quality Commission to become the registered manager. The registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are 'registered persons'. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run. The manager had recently started working at the home and had previously been a registered manager of a nearby home owned and run by the same company.

People told us they felt safe. Staff demonstrated they knew how to identify signs of abuse and felt confident raising any concerns they had. The home had processes in place to ensure any concerns were investigated appropriately.

Changes had been made to improve staffing levels at mealtimes. We saw people were supported patiently to eat and drink at their own pace.

Checks were made on staff before they started work to help prevent employment being offered to people who were unsuitable to work with vulnerable people.

People’s medicines were stored appropriately and senior care workers had received training from a pharmacy so they knew how to support people to take their medicines safely.

The ability of people to consent to receiving support was assessed. Where people lacked capacity and decisions had to be made on their behalf, meetings with appropriate people were held so that any decisions were made in the person's 'best interest'. Where people needed to be deprived of their liberty for their own safety applications were made to the local authority for them to authorise this.

People’s needs were kept under regular review and where their needs had changed and they needed support from other healthcare providers, prompt referrals were made and staff supported people to attend appointments if family members were not able to.

People working in the home told us they felt well supported by the manager although some care workers commented they did not always have sufficient time set aside for them to complete training.

People told us they were supported in a caring and respectful way. Throughout the inspection we observed people being supported in a friendly compassionate way.

Care workers knew the people living in the home well and supported them to make choices and respected their decisions.

People were encouraged to remain as independent as possible and were encouraged to do the things they could for themselves. People were also encouraged to be part of the local community and trips outside the home were facilitated by staff.

In addition to the activities outside the home, a variety of activities was available within the home both as groups or individually with the wellbeing coordinator.

Complaints and comments about the service were encouraged and viewed by the management as an opportunity for learning. We saw examples where improvements to the service had been made as a result of complaints.

People were encouraged to raise issues with management and regular meetings were held with people living in the home, their relatives and staff. People told us they felt their ideas were listened to.

The service had a quality management system in place where results of regular quality checks and audits were entered to allow the results to be analysed and areas of improvement identified.

The service worked well with other organisations to ensure good outcomes for people.