We carried out a review of the data available to us about Alan Hudson Day Treatment Centre on 6 July 2023. We have not found evidence that we need to carry out an inspection or reassess our rating at this stage.
This could change at any time if we receive new information. We will continue to monitor data about this service.
If you have concerns about Alan Hudson Day Treatment Centre, you can give feedback on this service.
Our rating of this location stayed the same. We rated it as outstanding because:
We found areas of good practice:
Day treatment for adult patients accessing palliative care was the only activity provided at this centre. We rated this service as good for safe, effective and well-led. Responsive and caring were rated as outstanding.
The provider, Arthur Rank Hospice Charity, also provides a range of services, including a number of in-patient beds, at the Arthur Rank Hospice in Cambridge.
The Alan Hudson Day Treatment Centre (the Centre) has been offering a service to the people of Wisbech and the surrounding area for a number of years. The service was transferred from the NHS to the Arthur Rank Hospice Charity in August 2015. This is the first ratings inspection since registration. This inspection included two inspection visits to the Centre, on 21 and 27 July 2017.
This service requires a registered manager as a condition of its registration. 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. There was a registered manager in place. She had been managing the Centre for 11 years and was registered with the CQC in January 2017 when the Arthur Rank Hospice Charity was registered as the provider.
The warm, welcoming and relaxed atmosphere at the Centre provided people and their families with a safe haven at some of the most difficult times of their lives. People were made to feel comfortable and were provided with care and treatment by an exceptionally caring and supportive staff team.
People had developed complete trust in the staff and told us they felt safe at the Centre. Staff had been trained to an extremely high standard and had developed skills to enable them to do their job safely and well. They were competent and confident to recognise and report if a person, or their family members, were at risk of avoidable harm or abuse. Potential risks to each individual were assessed and guidelines put in place so that the risks were minimised.
Staffing levels were very good and there were enough staff on duty, with a range of skills, to make sure people were safe. Staff underwent a robust recruitment procedure, which ensured that only staff suitable to work at this service were employed. Medicines were administered and managed safely and fully in line with national guidance.
Staff received a thorough induction, which included attending the provider’s Cambridge service for some training topics. A very wide range of training, some of which was at degree level, was offered to staff to ensure they had the skills and knowledge to care for people in the best way possible. Staff’s competence to perform certain tasks was monitored a number of times until the registered manager and the member of staff were both confident that the staff member was able to perform the task safely and well.
The CQC monitors the operation of the Mental Capacity Act (MCA) 2005 and the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS), which apply to care services. Staff fully understood the principles of the MCA and DoLS and ensured that people were empowered and supported to make decisions about every aspect of their life.
People were supported and encouraged to eat and drink well and the food provided was nutritious, tasty and met people’s special dietary needs when required. Staff liaised with a wide range of external healthcare professionals to ensure that each person’s health care needs were met.
Staff were, without exception, kind, compassionate and caring. People, their relatives and external professionals could not praise the staff team highly enough. They gave numerous examples of occasions when they felt staff had ‘gone the extra mile’. People, their relatives and the staff valued the mutually respectful, supportive and genuine relationships they had with each other.
Staff treated people with great respect for their privacy and dignity and confidentiality was maintained at all times. Each person was made to feel that they mattered by staff who knew them, their hopes and fears, likes and dislikes and what they needed, extremely well. Holistic assessments of each person’s needs were undertaken and formed the basis for detailed and personalised care plans. People and their relatives were always involved in decisions about their care.
The service was exceptionally responsive to each person’s needs and holistic and totally personalised care and support was provided by the staff. People had opportunities to decide on the care and treatment they wanted to receive, including plans for the end of their life when that was appropriate.
Staff provided clinical support to people who were admitted to the in-patient beds in the adjacent hospital ward. This meant that people received care and support from staff they trusted and knew well. It also meant that people were able to die where they wanted to because staff provided this service beyond the borders of the Centre.
There was a culture in the service that enabled staff to continually look at what more they could do for people. People were reassured that they were receiving the right treatment because staff undertook a number of additional tests to make sure that the treatment people had been referred for was appropriate.
The provider encouraged people to make comments about the service and had a well-advertised complaints process in place. No formal complaints had been received but people were sure that if they did need to raise any issues, they would be resolved quickly.
The registered manager provided very strong leadership and the Centre was exceptionally well-led. Staff worked within a culture of continuous improvement, which meant that they strove to find ways to improve on what was already an excellent service.
The registered manager was instrumental in developing the service. She had been involved in a number of innovative projects, including the development of a policy for medicines to treat high levels of calcium and the reduction of skeletal related events in people with cancer. The policy had been adopted by the local NHS trust, which meant that the registered manager had directly influenced best practice in regards to the treatment for people with cancer locally.
The provider had a robust clinical governance system in place, which ensured that all aspects of the service were audited and monitored and improvements made where needed. The Centre had an excellent reputation within the local community and with other health care colleagues and was truly valued by everyone who came into contact with it.