Gloucester House

Updated 18 January 2022

Gloucester House provides residential rehabilitation for up to 13 men in recovery from substance misuse. The service is based in a listed three-storey townhouse located in Highworth market square. The majority of placements are funded by local authorities. However, Gloucester House occasionally takes private self-funders. The service also had a ‘buy-a-bed’ fundraising scheme to provide treatment for men who are unable to access local authority funding or fund treatment themselves.

Treatment at Gloucester House is abstinence-based. It is designed around the 12-step programme. The service provides psychosocial support and does not provide detoxification. Clients requiring detoxification attend a different centre before their admission to Gloucester House.

The service is registered to provide accommodation for persons who require treatment for substance misuse.

The service was last inspected in 2019 and rated as outstanding overall.

The service had a registered manager in place at the time of the inspection, although he was due to leave the service shortly afterwards. The provider planned to submit an application for the programme co-ordinator to become the CQC registered manager.

We undertook this inspection as part of a random selection of services rated Good and Outstanding to test the reliability of our new monitoring approach.

What people who use the service say

People who used the service were overall very positive about the service they received. They said that staff were kind, compassionate and caring and really appreciated that they gave them the opportunity to be themselves and work through the programme at their own pace. Clients felt involved in their care and told us that staff were always available when they needed them.

Updated 18 January 2022

Gloucester House is a residential substance misuse service in Highworth, a small market town close to Swindon. The service delivers psychosocial treatment for up to 13 males based on the 12-step programme. This is a set of principles that assists people suffering from addiction by providing individual action steps.

Our rating of this location went down. We rated it as requires improvement because:

• There was a lack of oversight and a lack of quality assurance processes in place. The service did not have a risk register and few audits took place. Where audits did take place these were often incomplete or there was a lack of evidence of any action having been taken.
• Compliance with mandatory training was very low. Only 25% of staff were up to date with their safeguarding training.
• Staff were supposed to receive supervision every six weeks, however this was not taking place.
• Regular team meetings did not take place which meant staff did not have an appropriate forum to communicate with one another.
• The different teams within the service did not operate well as a multidisciplinary team.
• Clients did not have contemporaneous care records in place.
• There was no alarm system in place to enable clients in their bedrooms to summon assistance from staff in the event of an emergency.

However:

• There was a clear focus on recovery within the service and clients were encouraged to take ownership of this.
• Clients we spoke with gave excellent feedback about the service and the way staff treated them. They told us they felt involved in their care.
• There was a clear process in place for clients who were self-administering medicines.
• Staff worked well with other agencies to ensure the best outcomes for clients, for example they had a positive working relationship with a local GP surgery.
• There was a good range of activities on offer for clients, including woodwork, pottery, gardening and art.
• No clients at the service had tested positive for COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic.

Updated 18 January 2022

Our rating of this location went down. We rated it as requires improvement because:

• There was a lack of oversight and a lack of quality assurance processes in place. The service did not have a risk register and few audits took place. Where audits did take place these were often incomplete or there was a lack of evidence of any action having been taken.
• Compliance with mandatory training was very low. Only 25% of staff were up to date with their safeguarding training.
• Staff were supposed to receive supervision every six weeks, however this was not taking place.
• Regular team meetings did not take place which meant staff did not have an appropriate forum to communicate with one another.
• The different teams within the service did not operate well as a multidisciplinary team.
• Clients did not have contemporaneous care records in place.
• There was no alarm system in place to enable clients in their bedrooms to summon assistance from staff in the event of an emergency.

However:

• There was a clear focus on recovery within the service and clients were encouraged to take ownership of this.
• Clients we spoke with gave excellent feedback about the service and the way staff treated them. They told us they felt involved in their care.
• There was a clear process in place for clients who were self-administering medicines.
• Staff worked well with other agencies to ensure the best outcomes for clients, for example they had a positive working relationship with a local GP surgery.
• There was a good range of activities on offer for clients, including woodwork, pottery, gardening and art.
• No clients at the service had tested positive for COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic.