Feltwell Lodge

Feltwell Lodge is a residential care home providing personal care and accommodation to up to 45 people. The service provides support to older people and people living with dementia. At the time of our inspection there were 33 people using the service. The home is an adapted period building with accommodation over two floors.

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

Some areas of the service required improved oversight of safety and quality monitoring. An uncovered and hot radiator in one person’s bedroom presented a burn risk. Monitoring of people’s fluid intake wasn’t always completed to reduce the risk of dehydration.

The provider did not follow the latest COVID-19 government guidance and required people’s relatives to make an appointment to visit them. We have made a recommendation that the provider work in accordance with the guidance and remove restrictions on visiting.

People were practically supported, by care staff to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests. However, records did not evidence this approach as required by the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA). We have therefore made a recommendation regarding adherence to the MCA. Some relatives told us they were not always involved in their family members care planning.

Most medicines practices were safe, and people received their prescribed medicines in the way they preferred, however improvements were needed to the record keeping of topical medicines.

Feedback from relatives and people was positive about the care and support people received, and the friendliness of the staff team. However, end of life care plans were not completed where people were receiving care at the end of their lives or to prepare for this. We have made a recommendation to the provider to review their care planning process. Staff were positive about how the service was managed and the culture and morale of the team.

There were sufficient safely recruited staff on duty to keep people safe. People were kept safe from the risk of abuse and staff understood their safeguarding responsibilities and any action they needed to take.

The registered manager was transparent and committed to learning lessons when things went wrong. Throughout the inspection, the registered manager displayed a transparent approach. They spoke openly about challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and shared the plans they had in place to address them.

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

Rating at last inspection

Following a change to the providers legal entity, this service was re-registered with us in November 2020 and this is the first inspection since that date.

Why we inspected

We inspected this service due to it being a newly registered service.

We looked at infection prevention and control measures under the Safe key question. We look at this in all care home inspections even if no concerns or risks have been identified. This is to provide assurance that the service can respond to COVID-19 and other infection outbreaks effectively.

Enforcement and Recommendations

We have identified a breach in relation to good governance at this inspection. We also made three recommendations that the provider work to best practice in end of life care, ensuring they work to The Mental Capacity Act and in ensuring people do not have any restrictions applied to their visitors.

We will continue to monitor the service and will take further action if needed. Please see the action we have told the provider to take at the end of this report.

Follow up

We will request an action plan from 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 continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.