Enter and View: Caton House care home

The purpose of this Enter and View programme was to engage with residents, their relatives, or carers, to explore their overall experience of living in Caton House care home. As well as building a picture of their general experience, we asked about experiences in relation to social isolation and physical activity.

Summary

Caton House is registered to provide nursing and personal care to a maximum of 62 residents.  At the time of our visit there were 57 people living at Caton House; with 32 residents housed on the first floor, which is the nursing floor and 25 residents in the general residential area situated on the ground floor.

As well as providing general residential, nursing, and dementia care, Caton House also offer a non-residential day centre on the ground floor for up to 10 individuals.

In respect of demographics:

Five residents were male and nine were female with an age range of 53 to 96 giving an average age of 82 years.

What we found

"We noted that all of the food looked and smelt appetising ... People also told us that the food was good...

Residents and families told us that, on the whole, the staff were friendly and kind. However, because people also told us that there were not always enough staff, this affected the level of care or attention that was able to be given to each person.  People also said that because of low staff numbers, call bells were not responded to in a timely manner. Some people said that the wait meant they were sitting in soiled continence pads for 30 minutes or more...

We... heard from a number of residents and their families that staff could be quite rough when providing personal care.

...We asked residents and their families if they had been involved in creating their care plans, and while a few people knew of their care plans, the majority of people said no or didn’t know what a care plan was."  

What residents told us: 

“My favourite thing is the kindness they show Mum.”

“Only came for a couple of weeks, decided to stay, like it here.”

“Staff are kind, caring and respectful.”

“Some staff are a bit rough; most are really kind and caring.”

“Like some staff more than others.”

Recommendations included:

• Review the status of those currently bedbound residents and consider whether they could be helped to be more mobile through better equipment or physical therapy.
• Consider ways of alleviating isolation for those residents that have mobility issues, more one to one time with care staff, more time in group situations, enlist the help of volunteer groups such as befriending services to sit and talk with residents.
• Explore options for more varied activities that could be inclusive of those less mobile residents or look at designing an activity program specifically bedbound residents, particularly those who also have sight and hearing impairments.