Rap for council over Rotherham respite care centre

ROTHERHAM council officials have been handed a slap on the wrist by a care watchdog.

The borough council was warned by the Care Quality Commission that it was failing to meet government standards covering “respect and involvement” and “records management” at Treefields Resource Centre in Greasbrough.

The CQC said that the council was not protecting the safety and welfare of centre users after an unannounced visit by inspectors.

Treefields Resource Centre is a six-bed service providing respite care to people with learning disabilities.

The CQC reviewed care records for people using the service and said that it had found minimal evidence that people had contributed to decisions about their care, or had been asked to express their preferences or views.

Several of the records reviewed by inspectors were incomplete, the CQC said, and in three files no risk assessments had been completed.

In some cases, care plans and risk assessments had not been reviewed and updated within the required timescales.

Shona McFarlane, the council’s director of health and wellbeing, said that the authority had taken every action possible to rectify the concerns outlined by the CQC but stressed that no-one at the centre has been harmed or placed at risk and that no safeguarding issues had been received in respect of this home.

She added: “The council acknowledges that this service has fallen below the standards expected.

We obviously take this very seriously.

“We have put in place a team of people to systematically review and improve the care planning and record management arrangements within Treefields and over the past two weeks have met with every service user of this home and some of their families to address the concerns raised.

“We have also taken immediate steps to review the quality of care in every other similar service centre that is provided by the council.

“Safety and quality of care to our customers is our highest priority and so it is regrettable that we did not address all of the issues raised by CQC fast enough, which resulted in the issuing of these warning notices.

“We can assure people that we have now addressed the issues raised and are pleased that CQC found that Treefields was fully compliant in a number of areas.”

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