Archived: Dimensions - Fir Lodge 91 Bloomfield Avenue

We visited the service on 5 December 2011 and found that the service had made all the necessary improvements to be compliant with outcome 9 - management of medicines.

At this review, we found that improvements had been made and the service was now compliant with the requirements around valid consent. The service had arranged 'best interest' meetings for people who use the service, as part of reviewing their care and welfare.

We found that although some efforts had been made to correct errors in people's records for medication, some errors remained. When making the improvements, the service had made other errors and failed to remove records that contradicted each other.

On the day of our follow-up review we met with four of the five people who live at Fir Lodge. One person told us that they had a 'best interest' meeting and that it had gone well. We did not talk with people about their medications on this occasion.

We found that the service has made some steps to arrange best interest meetings for people who live at Fir Lodge. However, none of these meetings have yet taken place. We also found some errors and inconsistencies in the management of medicines, and some of the improvements requested at our previous review have not been undertaken.

We were told and we got the impression that the people who live at Fir Lodge are happy to be there. One person told us that he liked being there and people looked after him. He also had plenty to do and enjoyed going out and taking part in activities. These included visiting local places to follow his hobby of photography, and he was supported by a personal assistant who he funded directly to help with this.

He was also looking forward to visit Weston-super-Mare that weekend with staff from Fir Lodge to celebrate his birthday. Staff were also making him a decorated cake to celebrate. Staff said that birthdays were a 'big deal' for Fir Lodge and 'a lot of fuss' was made over the person on that day.

We were also told by the person we talked with that he has plenty of baths and clean clothes, and that he was well fed and has enough to drink. We were told that staff know what he likes to eat and that he can choose his meals.

He told us that no one working at Fir Lodge had ever shouted at him or at anyone else who lives there. He said that everyone is always kind. We talked with this person's relative and she also said that 'staff are lovely' and her relative 'gets on really well with them'. She also told us that she knew that her relative would make it very clear to her if something was going wrong or he was not happy.

Another person told us that he is happy with his room in the house and how it allows him to watch the cars going up and down the road, and people passing by, which he enjoys.

At our visit, we found that the service needs to make some improvements in how it enables people to give valid consent for the care and support they receive. We also have some minor concerns around management of medicines.