The Vale Residential Care Home

The Vale Residential Care Home is a ‘care home’. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care as single package under one contractual agreement. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection. The Vale Residential Care Home provides care and accommodation to a maximum of 28 people. There were 24 people living at the service at the time of our inspection, some of which were living with dementia.

At the last inspection, the service was rated Good. At this inspection, we found the service remained Good.

Why the service is rated Good.

At the time of our inspection there was a manager at the service who had applied to become registered with the Care Quality Commission. 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 are supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff support them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems in the service support this practice.

There continued to be arrangements in place to keep people safe and to help safeguard people from the risk of abuse. Staff understood their responsibilities for safeguarding people from harm and followed the provider’s policy and procedure. Potential risks associated with people, the environment and equipment had been identified and managed.

People continued to receive their medicines safely. There were systems in place to ensure that medicines had been stored, administered, audited and reviewed regularly. People were protected by the prevention and control of infection where possible. Accidents and incidents were monitored and recorded.

People’s needs and choices continued to be assessed when they started using the service. People received care that was personalised to their needs. People were supported to take part in meaningful activities which they enjoyed. People were encouraged to raise concerns or complaints and were asked for feedback about the service they received.

People continued to have access to food that they enjoyed and were able to access drinks and snacks throughout the day. People’s nutrition and hydration needs had been assessed and recorded. Staff and the kitchen team met people’s specific dietary needs and support. Staff ensured people remained as healthy as possible with support from health care professionals, if required.

Staff were seen to be kind and caring towards people. People and their relatives were involved with making decisions about care and support. People were treated with privacy and dignity.

There continued to be enough staff on duty with the right skills to meet people’s needs. Staff received the training and support that they needed to carry out their responsibilities in delivering care and support that was effective and responsive. Recruitment practices were safe and checks were carried out to make sure staff were suitable to work with people who needed care and support.

People and others were encouraged to express their views and had completed surveys. Systems were in place to monitor the quality of the service being provided to people. They were a range of checks and audits carried out to ensure the safety and quality of the service that was provided to people.

Further information is in the detailed findings below

We found that people were protected from the risks of unsafe or inappropriate care and treatment because accurate and appropriate records were being maintained.

A pharmacist inspector visited the service and looked at how medication was managed throughout the home. There were appropriate arrangements in place to manage medicines within the home.

We looked around the home and the environment. The service had appropriately risk assessed building work that was taking place in order to protect people's safety.

We looked at how the service monitored the quality of care that it provided. We saw that audits were in place and action was taken to make improvements. We found that people and their relatives were able to contribute their ideas as to how the service was run.

We looked at care records and management records held by the service. We found that care records were not always up to date to reflect people's current needs.

Staff we spoke with knew about different types of abuse and how to contact other agencies if they needed to.

Relatives of people we spoke with told us that they were pleased with the care that their relatives received. One person told us 'It is absolutely wonderful here'.

We looked at how medications were stored, dispensed and recorded. We saw that the processes in place were not appropriate for ensuring that medication was administered safely and medication was not always recorded accurately.

We saw that there was a complaints procedure available in a communal area of the home. Relatives of people we spoke with told us they were aware of the procedure but had never had a reason to make a complaint.

We looked at care records for people. We saw that some care records were not accurate and did not reflect all of people's needs.