Penn House Residential Home

Updated 23 February 2024

The inspection

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by 1 inspector and an Expert by Experience making calls to relatives following the site visit. An Expert by Experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

Service and service type

Pen House is a ‘care home’. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing and/or personal care as a single package under one contractual agreement dependent on their registration with us. Penn House is a care home without nursing care. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

Registered Manager

This provider is required to have a registered manager to oversee the delivery of regulated activities at this location. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Registered managers and providers are legally responsible for how the service is run, for the quality and safety of the care provided and compliance with regulations.

At the time of our inspection there was a registered manager in post.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was unannounced.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return (PIR). This is information providers are required to send us annually with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. We used all this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with 3 people who used the service and 6 relatives about their experience of the care provided. We used the Short Observational Framework for Inspection (SOFI). SOFI is a way of observing care to help us understand the experience of people who could not talk with us. We also spoke with 5 staff, including the registered manager, nominated individual and care staff. We looked at a range of records including 4 peoples care plans and 5 peoples medicines administration records. We also looked at a range of management records including staff recruitment files, training records and quality audits.

Updated 23 February 2024

About the service

Pen House is a residential care home providing personal and nursing care to up to 26 people. The service provides support to older people some of who were living with dementia. At the time of our inspection there were 16 people using the service.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

Systems were not ensuring medicines administration records were completed accurately; however, medicines had been administered as prescribed. People were kept safe as staff understood how to recognise and report any concerns about potential abuse and could manage known risks to people’s safety. There were enough staff to support people safely, and when incidents occurred there were systems in place to learn from these and prevent things from happening again. The home was kept clean, and staff understood how to protect people from the risk of cross infection.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

Systems were in place to check on the care people had received and ensure accurate care records were in place. There were opportunities for feedback about the service to be sought and this was used to support learning and development of the service. There were other professionals involved in people’s care and people received person centred support. The registered manager was approachable and responsive to any concerns raised.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection and update

The last rating for this service was requires improvement (published 2 October 2023). The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve. At this inspection we found improvements had been made and the provider was no longer in breach of regulations.

Why we inspected

The inspection was prompted in part due to concerns received about risk management and medicines. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks.

This inspection also followed up on action we told the provider to take at the last inspection.

We carried out an unannounced comprehensive inspection of this service on 25 July 2023. A breach of legal requirements was found. The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve governance.

We undertook this focused inspection to check they had followed their action plan and to confirm they now met legal requirements. This report only covers our findings in relation to the Key Questions Safe and Well-led which contain those requirements.

For those key questions not inspected, we used the ratings awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating. The overall rating for the service has changed from requires improvement to good based on the findings of this inspection.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Penn House Residential Home on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.