Ashbourne Court Care Home

Updated 17 July 2021

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. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team

The inspection was undertaken by two inspectors and an Expert by Experience. An Expert by Experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

Service and service type

This service is a care home. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care as a single package under one contractual agreement. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

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

This inspection was unannounced.

What we did before the inspection

Before the inspection, we reviewed all the information we held about the service including previous inspection reports and notifications received by the Care Quality Commission. A notification tells us about important issues and events which have happened at the service. We sought feedback from health and social care professionals. We used all of this information to plan our inspection. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return. This is information providers are required to send us with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. This information helps support our inspections.

During the inspection

Some people were not able to fully share with us their experiences of using the service. Therefore, we spent time observing interactions between people and the staff supporting them in communal areas. We spoke with ten people who used the service, the registered manager, deputy manager and the regional support manager.

We reviewed seven people’s care records. The medicines administration records for 20 people, four staff files and a variety of other records relating to the management of the service were also reviewed.

After the inspection

We received feedback from 10 relatives about the care provided and spoke, or received feedback, from 23 members of staff across a variety of roles. Five health and social care professionals also provided feedback about the service. We also continued to seek clarification from the provider to validate evidence found.

Updated 17 July 2021

About the service

Ashbourne Court is a care home providing personal and nursing care to up to 64 people. There were 57 people using the service when we inspected. The accommodation is arranged over three floors. The Charlton Unit cares for people living with dementia and is on the top floor. The Watermills unit is on the first floor and provides nursing care. The Anton Unit, on the ground floor, provides residential care and so the people on this unit are generally more independent. There are no registered nurses based on this unit and any nursing needs are met by the community nursing team.

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

The registered manager was well respected, and staff described him as a “Good leader”, “Passionate” and “Dedicated”. People and their relatives continued to have faith in his ability to ensure positive outcomes for people and the social activities met people’s individual needs and helped them to lead as full a life as possible. There were effective quality assurance systems in place. There continued to be a culture within the service of promoting education and learning. People, their relatives and health and social care professionals were confident staff had the right competence, knowledge and experience to provide effective care. The leadership team and nursing staff collaborated with partner organisations effectively and this helped to ensure positive outcomes for people.

There were sufficient staff deployed to meet people’s needs. People and their relatives told us the service provided safe care and risks were well managed. Medicines were managed safely and people, their relatives and professionals felt the service had responded well to the infection control challenges the virus presented. The provider had appropriate policies and procedures which ensured staff had clear guidance about what they must do if they suspected abuse was taking place. Staff were confident that any concerns raised would be acted upon by the registered manager to ensure people’s safety.

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 ‘Outstanding’ (published August 2019).

Why we inspected

The inspection was prompted in part due to a concern about a safety related incident which had occurred within the service. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe and well-led only. We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at continued risk of harm from this concern. The provider has undertaken a thorough investigation. This had identified a number of learning outcomes and there is an action plan in place to address these.

Please see the safe and well led sections of this full report.

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. The overall rating for the service has changed from outstanding to good. This is based on the findings at this inspection.

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.