A south London substance misuse service that was previously a cause for concern for the Care Quality Commission has been described as having made ‘huge improvements - above and beyond the improvements we expect most providers to be able to achieve’.
The U Turn Recovery Project in Brockley, London Borough of Lewisham, was inspected in July 2017 to check the progress that had been made since CQC’s last inspection in September 2016, when inspectors discovered a number of regulation breaches.
The service provides residential rehabilitation for men who misuse alcohol and drugs. It has 15 beds.
Improvements CQC found included:
The assessment and management of client risks had improved and the way medicines were managed had significantly improved. This meant that the care clients received was safer.
When incidents did occur, a system was in place so that staff learnt from incidents to minimise them being repeated. The service had a system of standards, procedures and audits, which ensured that the quality and safety of the service was monitored.
Clients in the service were fully involved in their care, and the service made sure that clients’ individual needs were met.
The manager had involved all staff in all of the changes to the service. This led to changes being quickly embedded into practice. The manager had demonstrated exceptional leadership to bring about the scale of change in the service since the previous inspection.
Paul Lelliott, CQC’s Deputy Chief Inspector (Mental Health) said:
“We do not currently rate independent standalone substance misuse services. However, at U Turn Recovery Project we found huge improvements - above and beyond the improvements we expect most providers to be able to achieve."
“We inspected this service last year and served five Warning Notices. In our inspection programme, we have found that many substance misuse services that do not provide high quality care. We therefore need to celebrate the success of this provider to demonstrate what can be achieved.”
You can read the full report on our website.
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we found huge improvements - above and beyond the improvements we expect most providers to be able to achieve
Paul Lelliott, CQC’s Deputy Chief Inspector (Mental Health)