Archived: Cherry Trees Care Home

Updated 9 September 2020

The inspection

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team

The inspection team comprised of three inspectors.

Service and service type

Cherry Trees Care Home is a ‘care home’. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care as a single package under one contractual agreement. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was unannounced.

What we did before the inspection

We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return. This is information providers are required to send us with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. This information helps support our inspections.

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service.

During the inspection

We spoke with six people who used the service and four relatives about their experience of the care provided. We spoke with 12 members of staff including the nominated individual, regional manager and registered manager. The nominated individual is responsible for supervising the management of the service on behalf of the provider.

We 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 reviewed a range of records, including medication administration records (MAR’s), care records staff personnel files, training records as well as information relating to the health and safety and management and oversight of the service.

After the inspection

We continued to seek clarification from the provider to validate evidence found. We looked at training data and quality assurance records. We spoke with three professionals who regularly visit the service.

Updated 9 September 2020

About the service

Cherry Trees Care Home is a nursing and residential care home providing personal and nursing care to 57 people aged 65 and over at the time of the inspection. The service can support up to 89 people.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

Information received prior to the inspection showed people did not always receive safe care. Although staff were trained on how to identify and report suspected abuse, we saw occasions where seven staff members had failed to escalate concerns, which led to delays in safeguarding action being taken. At this inspection people confirmed they felt safe and raised no concerns about the staff who provided their care. Relatives were also complimentary about the staff. We were satisfied the provider had taken appropriate steps to address shortfalls in respect of safeguarding people before we came to inspect.

The home was clean and generally infection prevention control risks were well-managed. Some areas of the building were beginning to show signs of wear and tear, which the management team assured us they had plans in place to address. Medicines were managed in a safe and proper way. Staff were recruited safely and there were enough staff to meet people’s needs.

The culture of the service was not always person-centred as poor practice was not consistently challenged or escalated by other staff members. Staff said the registered manager was approachable and responsive. We felt staff engagement practices could be refined, so staff had more planned opportunities to give feedback about the service or raise concerns should they need to. Where we identified improvements at inspection, the registered manager had taken swift action to address our concerns. The provider had systems in place to monitor and improve the quality and safety of the service. Policies and procedures were straight forward and covered all aspects of service delivery.

Throughout the inspection we saw caring interactions between staff and people who used the service. Feedback received about staff was positive, however, there had been occurrences of poor practice which did not promote people’s privacy and dignity. Although the provider had acted to prevent further occurrences of poor practice before we came to inspect, in order to achieve a rating of ‘good’ overall, more time was needed to show these improvements were embedded into the care people received.

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 23 May 2018).

Why we inspected

We received concerns about poor privacy and dignity practices. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe, caring and well-led only.

We reviewed the information we held about the service. No areas of concern were identified in the other key questions. We therefore did not inspect them. Ratings from previous comprehensive inspections for those key questions were used in calculating the overall rating at this inspection.

The overall rating for the service has changed from good to requires improvement. This is based on the findings at this inspection. We have found evidence that the provider needs to make improvement. Please see the safe, caring and well-led sections of this full report.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Cherry Trees Care Home on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service until we return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.