Enter and view: Beech House Residential Care Home

Healthwatch Salford carried out an Enter and View visit to Beech House, a residential care home with places for up to 36 residents.

The home was evaluated against eight quality indicators: strong, visible management; staff with the time and skills to do their jobs; good knowledge of each individual resident and how their needs may be changing; a varied programme of activities; quality, choice and flexibility around food and mealtimes; ensuring residents can regularly see health professionals such as GPs, dentists, opticians or chiropodists; accommodating residents’ personal, cultural and lifestyle needs; and being an open environment where feedback is actively sought and used.

At the time of Healthwatch Salford's visit, the new manager of Beech House Residential Care Home had only been in post for 3 weeks and as such was unaware that the Enter and View was going to be taking place at that arranged time. Nonetheless, she was welcoming and very open in her responses as to what she would like to change about the home. Unfortunately, after the visit, this manager left and Healthwatch Salford were then in contact with a development manager who responded to the report and recommendations.

Residents seemed to be quite happy in their daily life at the home, but it was noted that the severe lack of activities and restricted food menu contributed to boredom and lack of general interest and appetite.

There appeared to be mixed sentiments from the staff team during interview, with newer staff feeling more stressed and being less aware of procedures and policies, such as each resident having a food and fluid chart and knowing where to find information in the care plan.

On the whole staff seemed dedicated to care but with some divide between staff, i.e. some viewed others as less caring when they acted like it was just a job and not helping or answering the questions of newer staff. The staff interviewed said that this negatively impacted on the care provided and morale within the team. The manager was aware of many of the issues around staffing and the report highlighted that staff were also aware and seeing these issues too, so with some constructive changes involving staff these areas could be improved.

Based on these findings, Healthwatch Salford made a number of recommendations. The report includes a positive response to these recommendations from the service provider.