Archived: Pennine Lodge

Updated 6 November 2015

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection checked whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

This inspection took place on the 12th,13th and 14th of August and was unannounced.

The home was inspected by two adult social care inspectors and an expert by experience in older persons care. An expert-by-experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

Before the inspection the provider completed a Provider Information Return (PIR). This is a form that asks the provider to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We also reviewed the information we held about the service, such as notifications we had received from the registered provider. A notification is information about important events which the service is required to send us by law. We planned the inspection using this information.

We spoke with 25 staff including the registered manager, the deputy manager and the area manager, 12 people who used the service, eight relatives and one visiting professional.

We looked at 10 written records of care and other policies and records that related to the service including quality monitoring documents.

We looked around all the communal areas of the home and with people’s permission some bedrooms.

Updated 6 November 2015

This inspection took place on the 12th,13th and 14th of August and was unannounced.

Pennine Lodge is a recently built 70 bedded care home. It operates across two floors and provides nursing and personal care. The ground floor is occupied by older people who are physically frail and the first floor accommodates people living with dementia. There are several large and small communal areas and a hairdressing area. The home is set in its own grounds which includes a parking area and gardens.

The home was last inspected on 6th and 7th October 2014. At this inspection we rated the service as inadequate. The home was in breach of the following regulations of the Health and Social Care Act (HAS) 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010:

Regulation 23 HSCA 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010 Supporting workers

Regulation 24 HSCA 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010 Cooperating with other providers.

Regulation 9 HSCA 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010 Care and welfare of service users.

Regulation 19 HSCA 2008 (Regulated activities) Regulations 2010 Complaints

Regulation 10 HSCA 2008 (Regulated activities) Regulations 2010 assessing and monitoring the quality of service provision.

Regulation 22 HSCA 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010 Staffing.

The above regulations have now been replaced with the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014. We found that the home was no longer in breach of any of the above regulations and met all of the 2014 Regulations.

The service did not have a registered manager. A 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. However there was a temporary manager in place at the service.

The service had sufficient staff meet people’s needs at the time of our inspection but needed to maintain consistent staffing levels.

The staff knew how to identify abuse and protect people from it.

The home was clean and odour free.

The service had carried out risk assessments to ensure that they protected people from harm.

Medicines were ordered, stored, administered and disposed of correctly.

Staff had been trained to an appropriate standard.

Improvement was required to the way the service co-operated with other providers of health and social care.

People liked the food provided and were supported to take a good diet. However some care plans that related to people’s nutritional support did not reflect their individual assessments.

Staff had developed caring relationships with people who used the service.

Improvements had been made to the environment and we observed both structured activities and meaningful social engagement.

Support plans were written using a person centred approach but did not always reflect the information gathered in assessments.

There was a complaints process in place that the temporary manager had followed. However some complaints remained unresolved. We spoke with the temporary manager and recommended further engagement with relatives to ensure that complaints were brought to a conclusion.

There was a robust quality assurance system in place which meant that the temporary manager and area manager were aware of many of the areas that required improvement in the service.

The temporary manager had worked consistently to improve the service. The area manager had a clear vision as to the future of the service and intended to recruit permanent manager in the near future.