Alverstoke House Nursing Home

Updated 10 February 2022

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

As part of CQC’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic we are looking at how services manage infection control and visiting arrangements. We received information of concern about infection prevention and control measures at this service. This was a targeted inspection looking at the infection prevention and control measures the provider has in place. We also asked the provider about any staffing pressures the service was experiencing and whether this was having an impact on the service.

This inspection took place on 17 January 2022 and was announced. We gave the service one hours’ notice of the inspection.

Updated 10 February 2022

About the service

Alverstoke House Nursing Home is a care home providing accommodation and nursing care for up to 29 people, including people living with physical and nursing needs. There were 14 people living at the home at the time of the inspection.

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

During the inspection we identified significant improvements in all aspects of the service. People were happy living at Alverstoke House, spoke positively about the care they received and told us they felt safe.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible. However, some improvements were still required in relation to the service working within the principles of The Mental Capacity Act.

People's care plans and risk assessments contained detailed information about them and their care and support needs, to help staff deliver care that was individual to each person. These were reviewed regularly to ensure the care and support provided to people, continued to meet their needs.

New processes in relation to medicine management had been implemented. This had resulted in improvements in all aspects of medicine provision to ensure safe and effective administration.

Recruitment practices were effective, and we observed there were sufficient numbers of staff available to meet people's needs in a safe and unhurried way. Staff had received appropriate training and support to enable them to carry out their role safely. They received regular supervision to help develop their skills and support them in their role. People were protected from avoidable harm and individual, environmental and infection control risks were managed appropriately.

People were supported to access health and social care professionals when needed and received enough to eat and drink, however we received mixed views of the food provided.

People’s needs were met in a personalised way. Staff knew the people they supported well and had a good understanding of their needs. People were supported to partake in both group and one to one activities.

Effective quality assurance systems had been developed and implemented to continually assess, monitor and improve the quality of care people received.

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 inadequate (published 14 May 2021) and there were multiple breaches of regulations.

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.

This service has been in Special Measures since February 2021. During this inspection the provider demonstrated that improvements have been made. The service is no longer rated as inadequate overall or in any of the key questions. Therefore, this service is no longer in Special Measures.

Why we inspected

This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.

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 undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe, effective, responsive and well-led only. We reviewed the information we held about the service. No areas of concern were identified in the other key question. We therefore did not inspect it. Ratings from previous comprehensive inspections for this key question were used in calculating the overall rating at this inspection. Please see the safe, effective, responsive and well led sections of this full report.

The overall rating for the service has changed from Inadequate to Good. 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 Alverstoke House Nursing Home on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service until we return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.