3 November 2021
During an inspection looking at part of the service
Scotia Heights is a residential care home providing personal care and nursing care to 49 people at the time of the inspection. The service supports older people and younger adults who may have a mental health condition and physical disability.
Scotia Heights can support up to 60 people in six units across two floors. Each unit has its own communal dining and living areas with a kitchenette. A passenger lift gives people and staff access to all floors within the home.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
Despite concerns being raised prior to our inspection, people were supported by sufficient staff to help them stay safe and meet their needs. Following an increased use of agency staff, more permanent staff had been recruited and were waiting to start working at the home, which will improve the consistency of care. Recruitment practices were safe and appropriate checks were completed on potential new staff to make sure they were suitable to work with people living in the home.
Overall, safe infection prevention and control procedures were followed and the registered manager addressed issues with staff's use of personal protective equipment (PPE) following our inspection. People and staff had access to COVID-19 testing and vaccination. All visitors were tested in line with government guidance.
Safeguarding systems were in place for staff to follow which protected people and kept them safe. Staff knew how to and were confident in reporting any concerns they may have about a person’s safety.
Care plans reflected how care should be provided to people to minimise any risks to them; they were regularly reviewed to adapt the level of support needed in response to people's often rapidly changing needs.
People were supported to take their medicines safely and when they needed them. New systems were in place which had been effective in helping to reduce the frequency of medicine errors which had been occurring.
The leadership, management and oversight of the home had improved since our previous inspection. The provider had a governance framework in place which was effectively identifying and addressing issues. There was a focus on continuous learning and improvement to improve standards at the home.
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 overall, with well-led rated as requires improvement (published 15 December 2020).
Why we inspected
We had received concerns in relation to a high volume of medicine errors and concerns about staffing levels. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe and well-led only.
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.
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.
We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at risk of harm from these concerns. Please see the safe and well-led list sections of this full report.
The overall rating for the service has not changed. This is based on the findings at this inspection.
You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Scotia Heights on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.