Barrington Lodge Care Home

Updated 25 March 2022

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.

As part of CQC’s response to care homes with outbreaks of COVID-19, we are conducting reviews to ensure that the Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) practice is safe and that services are compliant with IPC measures. This was a targeted inspection looking at the IPC practices the provider has in place. We also asked the provider about any staffing pressures the service was experiencing and whether this was having an impact on the service.

This inspection took place on 14 February 2022 and was unannounced.

Updated 25 March 2022

About the service

Barrington Lodge is a care home providing nursing and personal care for up to 70 people aged 65 and over. At the time of inspection, there were 58 people living at the home some of whom had a dementia.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

We found that although there were systems and processes in place to support good infection prevention and control, they were occasions when PPE was not being worn correctly. The provider took immediate steps to address our concerns.

We have made a recommendation about the provider ensuring infection prevention control practices are consistent and understood by all staff.

People received safe care. There were systems in place to safeguard people from harm or abuse. Risk assessments were in place to support people to be as independent as possible. Staff were aware of their responsibility to keep people safe and were confident that any concerns raised would be acted upon by the manager.

Medicines were administered safely, and staff were knowledgeable about people’s needs. Staff undertook training in the safe management of medicines and regularly had their competencies assessed to ensure they were following the correct practices.

There were enough staff to meet people’s care needs. The service followed safe recruitment practices.

People and relatives told us they had no concerns about the service and any day to day issues they raised would be quickly resolved. Relatives had been kept informed of how their loved ones were when they had been unable to visit them in person.

Quality assurance systems were in place to monitor the quality of care and support people received. When people had accidents or incidents these were recorded, and actions taken to minimise the risk of reoccurrence.

Most staff we spoke with felt well supported in their roles. They told us they had clear guidance and the manager was available if they had any queries. Some, however, commented that communication with the management could be improved and they did not always know the outcome if they had raised an issue. The manager was taking steps to improve two-way feedback.

The service worked in partnership with other health and social care professionals to meet people's needs.

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; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection

The last rating for this service was good (published 25 February 2020).

Why we inspected

We received concerns in relation to infection control, medicines and the management of the service. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe and well-led only.

We looked at infection prevention and control measures under the Safe key question. We look at this in all care home inspections even if no concerns or risks have been identified. This is to provide assurance that the service can respond to COVID-19 and other infection outbreaks effectively.

We reviewed the information we held about the service. No areas of concern were identified in the other key questions. We therefore did not inspect them. Ratings from previous comprehensive inspections for those key questions were used in calculating the overall rating at this inspection.

We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at risk of harm from these concerns. Please see the safe and well-led sections of this full report.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Barrington Lodge on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service until we return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.