Great Oaks Care Home in Bournemouth still 'requires improvement'

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) deemed Great Oaks, which comes under Encore Care Homes, needed improvement in the ‘safe’ and ‘well-led’ categories.

The service currently accommodates 60 people, some living with dementia, and the report claimed people were not always protected from harm as safeguarding concerns had not been identified by management staff.

Staff had received safeguarding training but didn’t always report their concerns and the service did not notify the CQC of all incidents as legally required.

After the inspection last year, Encore Care Homes wrote to the CQC ensuring they would meet these requirements, but these actions had not been carried out.

The report read: “The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve. At this inspection enough improvement had not been made and the provider was still in breach of regulations.”

The CQC decided at the last inspection that Great Oaks’ leadership required improvement because the care home hadn’t established systems to monitor risks and improve services.

This was in breach of the Health and Social Care Act and Encore said they would meet the regulation by October 30, 2018.

The latest inspection found that these improvements had not been completed and there were “further shortfalls.”

It was revealed that staff hadn’t completed forms for all behaviour incidents, and reports for monitoring food intake were inconsistent.

The report said: “Following the last inspection the provider wrote to us and told us they had introduced a weekly audit to monitor food, fluid and repositioning charts for people.

“We found this had not been introduced. The registered manager and care and quality director told us they had never seen the form before.”

Rachel Dryden, CEO of Encore, said: “We are addressing all the issues raised by the CQC including notifying of events within service. We met with the CQC (Tuesday) and have reviewed progress since their inspection in October.

“They were very supportive of the changes implemented both within the home and from a corporate governance and oversight perspective.

“Most importantly our commitment remains to the residents we support and their families to deliver these improvements.

“Great Oaks care home ensure there are kind and caring relationships between staff and the residents they support. Our staff promote and respect people's dignity, privacy and independence.”

The care home did receive a ‘good’ rating for their quality of care, effectiveness and responsiveness.