Background to this inspection
Updated
30 August 2019
The inspection:
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.
Inspection team:
The inspection was carried out by three inspectors.
Service and service type:
Ballater House is a care home for people who require nursing and personal care. The service was divided into three units. Two of which were in the main building and the other was in an adjoining part of the building.
The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.
Notice of inspection:
We did not give any notice for this fully comprehensive inspection.
What we did:
Prior to this inspection we reviewed all the information we held about the service, including data about safeguarding and statutory notifications. Statutory notifications are information about important events which the provider is required to send us by law. We used information the provider sent us in the Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. This enabled us to ensure we were addressing potential areas of concern at our inspection.
As part of our inspection we spoke with four people and six staff. We also spoke with the registered manager and deputy manager.
We reviewed a range of documents about people’s care and how the service was managed. We looked at seven care plans, medication administration records, risk assessments, complaints records, policies and procedures and internal audits that had been completed.
Updated
30 August 2019
About the service:
Ballater House is a care home for people who require nursing or personal care. The service accommodates up to 16 people who have a learning disability, such as autism or epilepsy or behaviour that may challenge. At the time of our inspection, 14 people were living at the service.
People’s experience of using this service:
We found the service was not always meeting the characteristics of a good service. Although the service was working towards the principles that underpin the Registering the Right Support and other best practice guidance, there was further work to do to ensure people could live fulfilling lives with full autonomy. The values of Registering the Right Support include choice, promotion of independence and inclusion, ensuring people with learning disabilities and autism can live as ordinary a life as any citizen. For more details and a copy of the full report, please see the full report which is on CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Medicines management processes were not robust and although people had access to sufficient food and drink, staff did not always adhere to people’s individual dietary wishes.
People told us they felt safe living at Ballater House and that there were enough staff. People’s consent to their care and any restrictions placed upon them was authorised by the relevant authorities.
People told us they liked living at Ballater House and staff were kind. However, we found incidents when staff were not as respectful towards people as they could be. We also found that people were not always given the opportunity to participate in individualised, meaningful activities.
Individual staff did demonstrate kind attention towards people and it was clear from speaking to staff that they knew people well. There was good guidance in people’s care plans for staff to follow and people told us they could make their own decisions.
People had access to healthcare involvement when needed and they could make their wishes known through regular meetings. Staff told us they felt well trained and that they supported each other. They also had the opportunity to meet regularly.
Staff worked with other professionals to help to improve the service for people and they monitored the level of the service that was being provided.
We identified one breach of the Health and Social Care Act (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014 around medicines. Details of action we have asked the provider to take can be found at the end of this report.
Rating at last inspection: We last inspected this service in August 2016 when we awarded it a Good rating overall. The report was published on 2 September 2016.
Why we inspected: This inspection was carried out in line with our inspection methodology in that we scheduled the inspection based on our previous rating.
Follow up: We will continue to carry out ongoing monitoring on this service and we will ask them to provide us with an action plan to demonstrate to us how and when they will address the shortfalls we have identified at this inspection. A further inspection will be carried out within a 12 month period to check that appropriate action has been taken to improve the service.