Pennine Camphill Community

Updated 26 August 2023

The inspection

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

This was a targeted inspection to check on a concern we had about the safety of people living at the service.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by 1 inspector.

Service and service type

Pennine Camphill Community is a specialist residential college and a ‘care home’. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing and/or personal care as a single package under one contractual agreement dependent on their registration with us. Pennine Camphill Community is a care home without nursing care. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

Registered Manager.

This provider is required to have a registered manager to oversee the delivery of regulated activities at this location. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Registered managers and providers are legally responsible for how the service is run, for the quality and safety of the care provided and compliance with regulations.

At the time of our inspection there was a registered manager in post.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was unannounced.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return (PIR). This is information providers are required to send us annually with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. We used all this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with 4 staff and 4 people living at the service. We reviewed a range of records in relation to incidents, safeguarding, managing risks and staffing. We carried out observations of care.

Updated 26 August 2023

About the service

Pennine Camphill Community is an education disability service providing accommodation and personal care for up to 28 people. The service provides support to people who have a learning disability and autistic people. At the time of our inspection there were 20 people using the service, some of whom were accessing respite care.

The service had 1 house divided in to 4 corridors. There was a lounge, kitchen and dining area and a communal room. Each bedroom had an en-suite facility. The service had a sleep-in facility for staff.

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

We expect health and social care providers to guarantee people with a learning disability and autistic people respect, equality, dignity, choices and independence and good access to local communities that most people take for granted. ‘Right support, right care, right culture’ is the guidance CQC follows to make assessments and judgements about services supporting people with a learning disability and autistic people and providers must have regard to it.

Right Support:

People were not supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff did not support them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice. People’s independence was not always promoted, and we observed staff not seeking consent and imposing restrictions on people. People’s support needs and risks associated with their care were not always appropriately managed to ensure safe care could be provided.

Right Care:

People did not always receive person-centred care and their care plans did not show they were encouraged to make decisions about the support they received. Systems and processes were not effective in ensuring people were protected from the risk of abuse and staffing was not always provided in line with people’s needs. Staff did not always have the appropriate training to meet the needs of people. People’s medicines were not always safely managed. Recruitment was safely managed.

Right Culture:

Feedback from people, relatives and staff was mostly positive about the care received. However, we found the culture of the service did not reflect a positive and empowering ethos. The service worked in partnership with other health and social care professionals to seek advice on providing effective care, although we found this was not always recorded. The service was not using governance processes effectively to learn lessons or improve the service. A new management structure had been recently implemented to address the culture of the service and governance oversight. Staff told us they felt supported in their roles.

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 good (published 7 April 2020). The overall rating for the service has changed from good to inadequate based on the findings of this inspection. You can see what action we have asked the provider to take at the end of this full report. The registered manager and head of care were responsive to the concerns found by us and took action to mitigate immediate risks to people during the inspection. They told us they would address wider concerns after the inspection.

Why we inspected

The inspection was prompted in part due to concerns received about medicines, risks associated with people’s care, staffing levels, safeguarding concerns and staff training. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks.

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.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Pennine Camphill Community on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Enforcement

We have identified breaches in relation to person-centred care, need for consent, safe care and treatment, safeguarding, good governance and staffing. We issued warning notices against the registered manager relating to the breaches of regulation 9 and 11. The registered manager did not submit an appeal or representations against the warning notices.

Follow up

The overall rating for this service is ‘Inadequate’ and the service is therefore in ‘special measures’. This means we will keep the service under review and, if we do not propose to cancel the provider’s registration, we will re-inspect within 6 months to check for significant improvements.

If the provider has not made enough improvement within this timeframe and there is still a rating of inadequate for any key question or overall rating, we will take action in line with our enforcement procedures. This will mean we will begin the process of preventing the provider from operating this service. This will usually lead to cancellation of their registration or to varying the conditions the registration.

For adult social care services, the maximum time for being in special measures will usually be no more than 12 months. If the service has demonstrated improvements when we inspect it and it is no longer rated as inadequate for any of the five key questions it will no longer be in special measures.