Bluebells Care Home

St Martins is a care home providing personal care and accommodation for up to 30 older people, some of whom may be living with dementia. At the time of our inspection, 25 people were living at the service. While relatives felt their loved ones were safe, our inspection identified that the overall quality of the service had deteriorated significantly, with numerous serious shortfalls found across leadership, safety, and daily care practices.

When it came to keeping people safe, potential health and welfare risks were not consistently assessed, and safety guidance was sometimes missing or incorrect. We found issues with fire safety preparedness, medication record-keeping, and the safe recruitment of staff. Additionally, staffing levels were frequently insufficient to meet people's needs, and staff had not always been properly trained or vetted before starting work.

Regarding the effectiveness of the care provided, pre-admission assessments were missing for new residents, and standard health and wellbeing monitoring tools were not consistently used. Staff did not always receive a proper induction or structured supervision, and residents were not consistently supported to make daily choices, such as selecting their preferred meals at lunchtime.

On a more positive note, the physical environment and hygiene practices were well-managed, and the service performed strongly in infection prevention and control, ensuring that visitors could be welcomed safely and that the spread of infection was properly minimized.

However, daily routines and care delivery lacked responsiveness to individual needs. Restrictions had been placed on aspects of daily life, such as where residents could eat their meals, and visitors had previously faced restrictions on accessing communal areas. Furthermore, incident reports and feedback from residents and relatives were not actively used to improve daily care or shape future service delivery.

Finally, the leadership and management of the service were deeply flawed, characterized by a closed and unprofessional culture where staff lacked confidence to raise concerns. Checks and audits failed to catch the issues we uncovered, though a newly appointed representative for the provider had recently started identifying these shortfalls and developing an action plan to address them.