About the service:High Meadows is a care home that is registered to provide personal and nursing care for up to 45 people aged 65 and over. At the time of the inspection there were 22 people living at the home. Some of the people were living with dementia or had physical disabilities. It is divided in to four units with two units on each of the two floors. When we visited only the ground floor was being used to accommodate people. The home is situated in a residential area of Pinner and is purpose-built. It opened in 2018 and this was its first inspection with the Care Quality Commission.
People’s experience of using this service:
People were happy with their care and support. One person said, “I would recommend it to everybody, in fact I have recommended it to a few people already.”
There were systems in place for the safe management of medicines. However, there was not always clear guidance for staff on when and where to administer people’s medicated cream or ointment when these were prescribed to be administered as required.
The risk management plans for supporting some people with their nutrition and skin integrity needs had been removed from the provider’s digital care records system, so it was not always clear how staff were to support them with these issues.
People had detailed care plans in place, but these were not consistently updated when there were changes to people’s care and did not set out how the service would meet people’s cultural, spiritual and recreational needs.
The manager addressed some of these issues during our inspection visit, but the systems to monitor the quality of the service had not been sufficiently robust to have identified or taken timely action on the areas for improvement we identified.
People told us that they felt safe and they were protected from the risk of infection.
Staff were caring, treated people with respect and promoted people’s dignity and privacy.
People and their relatives knew how to raise concerns or complaints and were confident they would be listened to. The provider sought feedback from people, relatives and staff and used this to develop the service.
The service provided a wide range of activities for people that were meaningful to them and they could choose how they spent their time.
Staff received induction, training and supervision and felt supported in their roles.
People were supported to have 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.
For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at the last inspection:
The service was registered on 8th May 2018 and this is their first inspection.
Why we inspected:
This was a planned inspection based on the timescale to inspect newly registered service.
Enforcement:
We have identified a breach of regulation in regard to good governance at this inspection. Please see the action we have asked the provider to take at the end of this report.
Follow up:
We will request an action plan for the provider to understand what they will do to improve the standards of quality and safety. We will work alongside the provider and local authority to monitor progress. We will return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.