Archived: The Lime Trees

Updated 30 September 2016

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection checked whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

This unannounced inspection was undertaken on 2 and 3 August 2016.

Before the inspection we reviewed information we had about the provider, including notifications of any safeguarding or other incidents affecting the safety and well-being of people using the service.

This inspection was carried out by two inspectors and an expert-by-experience. An expert-by-experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

We met with nine people who used the service and asked them if they were happy with their care and if they liked the home and the staff who supported them.

A few people could not let us know what they thought about the home because they could not always communicate with us verbally. Because of this we observed interactions between staff and people using the service as we wanted to see if the way that staff communicated and supported people had a positive effect on their well-being.

We also looked at the comments people and their relatives had made about the quality of the service from the results of the most recent quality survey carried out by the service.

We spoke with four staff, the registered provider and three relatives. We contacted the local authorities' contracts and quality monitoring teams to gain their views about the home.

We looked at six people’s care plans and other documents relating to their care including risk assessments and medicines records. We looked at other records held at the home including staff meeting minutes as well as health and safety documents and quality audits.

Updated 30 September 2016

This inspection took place on 2 and 3 August 2016 and was unannounced.

The Lime Trees is a care home that provides accommodation and care to a maximum of 20 older people who may also be living with dementia. There were also a number of younger people staying at the home, on a respite basis, who were recovering from strokes or a similar health crisis. On the day of the inspection there were 11 people residing at the home.

There was a registered manager in post but they were not available during our inspection. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission 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.

People told us they felt safe at the home. They told us that staff were kind and respectful and they were satisfied with the numbers of staff on duty at the home.

The management and staff at the home had identified and highlighted potential risks to people’s safety and recorded how these risks should be reduced.

Staff understood the principles of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA) and told us they would presume a person could make their own decisions about their care and treatment in the first instance. Staff told us it was not right to make choices for people when they could make choices for themselves.

The service had followed the appropriate procedures if someone needed to be deprived of their liberty for their own safety. However, the relevant and required notifications regarding Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS) were not to being sent to the Care Quality Commission (CQC).

People had access to healthcare professionals such as doctors, dentists, chiropodists and opticians and any changes to people’s needs were responded to appropriately and promptly.

People told us staff listened to them and respected their choices and decisions.

People using the service and their relatives were positive about the management of the home. They confirmed that they were asked about the quality of the service and had made comments about this. However, action was not always being taken to address these comments to ensure high quality care was delivered.

Although the service had a number of quality and safety audits these were not always effective in maintaining a safe environment.