5 June 2023
During an inspection looking at part of the service
River Meadows is a residential home which provides care over three floors to older people including people who have dementia. River Meadows is registered to provide care for 41 people. At the time of our inspection visit there were 34 people living at the home.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
The provider had systems to assess risks to people before undertaking their care and support. However, we found examples where risks had not been sufficiently monitored or recorded to effectively mitigate that risk. People received their medicines as prescribed, but records to support good medicines administration practices needed to be improved.
There were enough staff to provide safe care. Healthcare professionals told us staff were always available to support their visits which ensured effective communication and sharing of information. Staff understood their safeguarding responsibilities and the registered manager understood their responsibility to follow local safeguarding protocols when required.
People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice. Staff supported people’s communication by giving people information in a way they would understand.
Staff were responsive to people’s individual needs, although care plans did not always contain detailed information to help staff support people’s emotional needs. There was a lack of physical and emotional stimulation for people but plans were being made to encourage more engagement and activities people enjoyed.
The registered manager understood the needs of the people living in the home, advocated on their behalf and was committed to improving the quality of care people received. However, checks and audits had not always identified when improvements were needed and governance systems were not consistently effective in supporting the management team to improve and maintain standards of care.
For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at last inspection
The last rating for this service was good (published 21 October 2017).
Why we inspected
This inspection was prompted by a review of the information we held about this service. We looked at the key questions of Safe, Responsive and Well-led.
We looked at infection prevention and control measures under the Safe key question. We look at this in all care home inspections even if no concerns or risks have been identified. This is to provide assurance that the service can respond to COVID-19 and other infection outbreaks effectively.
For those key questions not inspected, we used the ratings awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating. The overall rating for the service has changed from Good to Requires Improvement . This is based on the findings at this inspection.
You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for River Meadows on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.
Enforcement
We have identified a breach in relation to Regulation 17 (Good governance).
We have found evidence that the provider needs to make improvements. You can see what action we have asked the provider to take at the end of this full report.
Follow up
We will request an action plan from 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 continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.