Sue Ryder - Thorpe Hall is a 20 bed hospice located on the outskirts of Peterborough city centre. It is registered to provide diagnostic screening procedures, transport services, triage and medical advice provided remotely and treatment of disease, disorder and injury. The hospice also provides accommodation with a specialist palliative care service for those people living with or affected by serious illness. An in-patient service and day centre to adults is also provided. The service is currently developing a ‘hospice at home’ service to provide care to people in a home setting.
Accommodation at the hospice consists of rooms for two to three people with separate communal bathrooms. There are internal and external communal areas, including lounge areas, a chapel which can also be used as a multi faith room, garden, coffee shop and shop for people and their visitors to use.
This unannounced inspection was carried out on 22 May 2015. On the day of the inspection there were 16 people accommodated at the hospice. At our previous inspection on 29 August 2013 the provider was meeting all of the regulations that we assessed.
There was a registered manager in place. They had been in the role of registered manager since 04 December 2014. 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.
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is required by law to monitor the operation of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA) and the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS) and report on what we find. There were systems in place to assess people’s capacity for decision making and, where appropriate, applications would be made to the authorising agencies for people who needed these safeguards.
People and their relatives were happy with the service provided by the hospice. Staff treated people and their relatives with kindness and compassion, whilst delivering care and treatment in an unrushed manner.
People’s wishes and preferences, including end of life wishes, were recorded within the care records as guidance for staff. Staff only commenced care for people if they could safely meet their needs. Staff demonstrated a good understanding of the wishes, including cultural and religious needs of people with an end of life illness.
There were a sufficient number of staff and volunteers in all areas of the service. Safety checks were undertaken on staff and volunteers before they commenced work at the service to ensure that they were of good character. Staff were aware of their responsibility to report any concerns around poor care and treatment. Staff were trained to provide effective care which met people’s individual care and support needs. They were supported by the management to maintain and develop their skills through ‘121’ supervision, competency checks and a meeting to set and agree personal development and training objectives.
Individual health risks to people were identified by staff and plans were put into place to minimise these risks. People were provided with adequate amounts of food and drink to meet their hydration and nutrition needs. The service worked with other health and social care providers to make sure that people’s health, care and support needs were supported and met. There were arrangements in place for the safe management, administration and storage of people’s prescribed medicines.
People were supported to raise any suggestions or concerns that they might have had with staff and the management team. Any issues raised were actioned by management to improve the service.
There was an on-going quality monitoring process in place to monitor the quality of support provided for people and identify areas of improvement required within the service.