Elderly residents placed at risk of ‘significant harm’ in Buckley care home

A non-compliance notice has been issued against a care home after inspectors found elderly residents were being placed at risk of ‘significant harm’.

Care Inspectorate Wales (CIW) has demanded that the owners of Bistre Nursing Home in Buckley take action after it raised serious concerns about the health and welfare of people living there following a visit in June.

Inspectors highlighted several individual cases in a report published this week, including a failure to accurately monitor the food and drink intake of a diabetic patient, placing them at risk of hypoglycaemia.

CIW said the home, which caters for people aged over 65, had not ensured that all residents have a written care plan, while risk assessments were also not being carried out properly.

In April the home was taken over by Chestnut Healthcare Group, whose management team said they were aware of the issues and had taken steps to address them by replacing some staff members, as well as introducing new care plans and carrying out refurbishments works.

In their report, CIW said: “The evidence indicates improvements are required in relation to care plans and associated risk assessments in order to assess and manage people’s needs appropriately and effectively.

“The impact for people using the service is they are not always receiving the right care at the right time because their care plans do not reflect their current needs, and therefore staff’s knowledge of their needs is conflicting.

“People are being placed at a higher risk due to risk assessments either not being completed, or not being reviewed to reflect their current needs, staff are therefore not always aware of the best way to support individuals to promote positive outcomes for them.

“People’s health and welfare is placed at significant risk due to their needs not being managed appropriately and proactively, to prevent further deterioration.”

Other cases raised by inspectors included one resident who lost 3.1kg between March 2018 and May 2018.
During their visit they observed that that resident was left alone at dinner time and staff did not encourage them to eat their meal, despite a care plan stating that they needed prompting.

The person’s lunch was on the table in front of them for 55 minutes before staff removed the cold plate of food.
Meanwhile, it also highlighted a failure to document whether sepsis checks had been carried out at regular intervals for a resident with pressure sores.

In response to the concerns, area manager Debbie Davies said the owners became aware of several issues on taking over the home and were keen to improve standards.

She said: “These issues were originally highlighted by myself and the Chestnut Group before the inspectors picked them up.

“Since then we’ve gone in there and redecorated the whole place because it hadn’t been touched in years.
“I found documentation wasn’t up to standard so we’ve got new documentation in Bistre, which is completely new care planning so that nothing can be missed.

“I’m afraid there’s been the dismissal of some staff and new staff have been employed.
“I’m monitoring the workload and we want to be transparent about everything. It has changed and it is changing.”

By Liam Randall – Local Democracy Reporter.