4 March 2021
During an inspection looking at part of the service
Long Lane 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. Long Lane cares for up to two people with learning difficulties. At the time of inspection two people were using the service.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
We expect health and social care providers to guarantee autistic people and people with a learning disability the choices, dignity, independence and good access to local communities that most people take for granted. Right support, right care, right culture is the guidance CQC follows to make assessments and judgements about services providing support to people with a learning disability and/or autistic people.
The service was able to demonstrate how they were meeting the underpinning principles of Right support, right care, right culture. People received person centred care that was inclusive and promoted their independence and choices.
Staff followed infection prevention control guidance. However, there was limited training in this area and no infection prevention control policy or audits in place. Some issues in the environment needed addressing such as having a lockable cupboard for cleaning chemicals.
Staff supported people as individuals. Medication was administered safely, and staff knew how to raise safeguarding concerns. The registered manager recruited new staff safely to the service.
Systems needed to be developed to provide governance and oversight of the service.
For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at last inspection
The last rating for this service was Good (published 13 February 2018).
Why we inspected
We received concerns in relation to infection prevention and control. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe and well-led only.
We reviewed the information we held about the service. No areas of concern were identified in the other key questions. We therefore did not inspect them. Ratings from previous comprehensive inspections for those key questions were used in calculating the overall rating at this inspection.
The overall rating for the service has changed from Good to Requires Improvement. This is based on the findings at this inspection.
We have found evidence that the provider needs to make improvements. Please see the Safe and Well Led sections of this full report.
You can see what action we have asked the provider to take at the end of this full report.
The provider has taken steps to address the areas of concern identified.
Enforcement
We are mindful of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our regulatory function. This meant we took account of the exceptional circumstances arising as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic when considering what enforcement action was necessary and proportionate to keep people safe as a result of this inspection. We will continue to discharge our regulatory enforcement functions required to keep people safe and to hold providers to account where it is necessary for us to do so.
Follow up
We will request an action plan for the provider to understand what they will do to improve the standards of quality and safety. We will work alongside the provider and local authority to monitor progress. We will return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.