26 July 2023
During an inspection looking at part of the service
Brandreth Lodge is a residential care home providing personal care to up to 24 people. The service provides support to older people. At the time of our inspection there were 16 people using the service. The home is set over 2 floors and had good sized communal areas and gardens for people to use.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
Risks to people’s health and safety were not always adequately assessed and mitigated, and changes were required to improve the safe management of medicines.
Improvements were required to the overall governance and risk management of the service; training and staff supervisions were overdue.
People were kept safe from the risk of abuse and the risk of mistakes being repeated was minimised. There were enough staff to care for people and the home was kept clean.
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.
We found a positive culture and the service had a ‘homely’ atmosphere. Staff enjoyed their jobs and said they had good support from the management.
For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at last inspection and update
The last rating for this service was requires improvement (published 14 September 2021) and there was a breach of regulation in relation to assessing, managing and monitoring risk. At this inspection we found the provider remained in breach of regulations.
Why we inspected
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.
We undertook this focused inspection to check they had followed their action plan and to confirm they now met legal requirements. This report only covers our findings in relation to the key questions safe and well-led which contain those requirements.
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 remained 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 Brandreth Lodge on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.
Enforcement
We have identified breaches in relation to assessing risk, managing medicines, and governance of the service.
Please see the action we have told the provider to take at the end of this report.
Follow up
We will meet with the provider following this report being published to discuss how they will make changes to ensure they improve their rating to at least good. We will work with the local authority to monitor progress. We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.