Barn Park Residential Home

On this page

• Overview
• Assessing needs
• Delivering evidence-based care and treatment
• How staff, teams and services work together
• Supporting people to live healthier lives
• Monitoring and improving outcomes
• Consent to care and treatment

People were supported to access health professionals. However, contact with health professionals and their subsequent advice was not routinely recorded in a manner which meant it could be easily audited. Decisions and discussions around consent did not routinely demonstrate good practice.

This service scored 71 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

We did not look at Assessing needs during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.

We did not look at Delivering evidence-based care and treatment during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.

We did not look at How staff, teams and services work together during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.

Visitors were reassured by staff contacting health professionals to support their relative’s health needs. They said when their relative became unwell, staff noticed the change and sought professional health advice. This included GPs, the district nurse team, chiropodist, and the older people’s mental health team. One relative said, “He has had all sorts of health scares, but they have seen him through them with the help of doctors, so I think they pay good attention to people’s health needs.”

Staff were clear on their responsibility to record and report people’s health changes to a more senior member of staff or to the manager to action a call to an appropriate health professional.

Contact with health professionals and their subsequent advice was not routinely recorded in a manner which meant it could be easily audited. For example, advice was recorded within daily care notes which made it harder to track previous advice from health professionals to see if there were patterns or themes. The information was minimal, which meant subsequent actions and decision making was sometimes unclear. Risk assessments relating to health needs had not been reviewed over 4 months in 2023 so records did not show how risks were monitored and records linked to nutritional intake also contained gaps where days had not been completed. This potentially put people at risk of harm as there was a lack of oversight to ensure their health needs were met.

We did not look at Monitoring and improving outcomes during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.

Relatives gave mixed feedback on how people’s consent was sought before carrying out a care task. We saw staff had different approaches with people living at the home. Most had a gentle manner, but occasionally interactions were more directive and the tone abrupt. The manager recognised which staff members needed further training and awareness in how they communicated with people and had started addressing this with them.

Staff explained how they asked for people’s consent for day to day support such as personal care and they could provide examples. Staff had heard of Deprivation of Liberties Safeguards, but most could not provide examples relating to the people they supported. This indicated training in this area had not enabled staff to consider how these were applied in practice.

Deprivation of Liberties Safeguards applications had been made for some individuals where appropriate but not others, despite restrictions being in place. Records were unclear so we contacted the local authority to confirm when applications had been made and shared this information with the manager. They subsequently made several new applications to ensure people were not being restricted unlawfully.