Archived: Forest Court Care Home

Updated 20 March 2018

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, 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 24, 25 and 30 January 2018. The inspection was unannounced and was carried out by one inspector with 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. Their area of expertise was dementia and mental health care.

Before the inspection, we reviewed information we held about the service including notifications. A notification is a report about important events which the service is required to send us by law. We used information the registered manager sent us in the Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We spoke with commissioners and read their ‘annual review visit report’ from August 2017. Commissioners also shared a ‘self-assessment’ completed by the registered manager of Forest Court Care Home in June 2017.

Throughout the inspection we observed the support being provided to people. We also used the Short Observational Framework for Inspection (SOFI). SOFI is a way of observing care to help us understand the experience of people who could not talk with us. We spoke with seven people who use the service and six relatives. We reviewed four people’s care files which included pre-admission assessments, care plans, risk assessments and documents relating to assessment of mental capacity and Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS). We checked medicines records for four people and observed a staff member administering medicines. We reviewed the processes in place for managing medicines, including the use of 'as required' medicines and medicines with additional storage and recording requirements.

We spoke with the provider’s area operations director, area quality director, the registered manager and their deputy. We also spoke with four nurses, two of whom were ‘bank’ nurses, two team leaders and another member of the care staff team, the head chef, head of maintenance, head housekeeper and the activities co-ordinator. We sought the views of six health and social care professionals, receiving received feedback from five of them. We looked at recruitment records for six staff, staff training records and rotas, complaints, accident and incident records, maintenance records and reviewed provider policies and quality assurance systems. We sat in on staff handover, a clinical risk meeting and the daily interdepartmental meeting.

Updated 20 March 2018

This inspection took place on 24, 25 and 30 January 2018. It was unannounced and was carried out by one inspector and an expert by experience.

Forest Court Care Home provides nursing and residential care for up to 40 people. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care as single package under one contractual agreement. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection. Forest Court specialised in the care of older people who lived with dementia or had mental health needs. At the time of this inspection 36 people were living there.

Accommodation at Forest Court is provided over two floors with bedrooms located on the ground and first floors. Both floors were wheelchair accessible, the first floor being accessed via lift or stairs. Most bedrooms had en-suite facilities and adapted communal bathrooms were available to all. The three lounges on the ground floor gave people a choice of a more stimulating or quieter environment to spend time with others. The garden was landscaped and fully wheelchair accessible and people could enjoy the views over the surrounding countryside.

Forest Court Care Home was registered under a new legal entity on 31 January 2017 and this is the first inspection of the home since then. Forest Court was sold on 15 December 2017 when the provider name changed to HC-One Oval Limited. Staff and the registered manager at Forest Court transferred across to the new owner, remaining in post at the home. At the time of this inspection, the home was beginning the transition toward operating within the HC One infrastructure. For example, the systems and policies in use had yet to changeover, so belonged to the previous owner. The changeover process was expected to be completed within six months.

The service had a registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) 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 registered manager was re-registered with CQC in January 2017 when the legal entity changed. They had been in post as manager of the home since 2009.

People benefitted from a service where their needs were put first and their safety maintained. There were enough suitable staff to meet people’s needs and they followed best practice guidelines to minimise risks to people, including when managing their medicines. When accidents or incidents occurred, the care people received was reviewed and lessons were learned to prevent a similar incident from occurring in future.

People were supported by skilled and experienced staff who understood their needs. In particular, the impact dementia may have on them and how to support them to minimise this. Staff were supported in their roles, they felt valued and worked as a team to meet people’s diverse needs. People were supported to eat and drink a nutritious diet and maintain their health and well-being through appropriate access to health care and social activities. People were encouraged to make their own decisions about the care they received wherever possible. Deprivation of liberty safeguards were in place where people were restricted of their liberty. Facilities at Forest Court were adapted to meet the needs of the people living there.

People received support from caring staff who valued and knew them. People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice. People's privacy was respected and they were treated with dignity, kindness and compassion. People were supported to maintain relationships with others who were important to them. They received personalised and responsive care which enabled them to live as full a life as possible. People could raise concerns about the service and have their complaints listened to.

Strong, open and consistent leadership at Forest Court provided stability and direction which had a positive impact on all involved. Leaders acted as role models to staff and were open to feedback from people, their relatives, staff and visiting care professionals. Feedback was taken into account to improve and develop the service provided. The registered manager maintained and updated their knowledge through local provider networks and with reference to local and national policies. Systems in place ensured key messages were communicated and the quality of the service was closely monitored.