CQC inspectors find evidence of abuse at Trowbridge care home

The CQC has rated the service at the Bows residential care home in Frome Road, Trowbridge, as being ’inadequate’ for being safe and well-led.

The home, run by John-Edwards Care Homes Ltd, provides support to five adults under 65 years with learning disabilities and/or autism.

During four days of inspection visits in May, it found that “a number of incidents” recorded on the provider’s incident reporting system had not been managed safely and that residents were at risk of further harm.

The CQC inspected the care home following concerns about the safety of residents and low staffing numbers which prevented residents from going out into the local community.

The report said: “For example, incidents of unexplained bruising, one incident where staff had physically restrained a person and two incidents where one person had slapped another person had not been shared with local safeguarding teams.

“This meant the provider could not be assured actions taken to keep people safe had occurred in all cases.

"The provider failed to have systems in place to safeguard people from the risk of abuse and improper treatment which placed them at risk of further harm."

The healthcare regulator also rated the service overall as ‘inadequate’ and as ‘requiring improvement’ for being effective, caring and responsive.

It plans to monitor the service at the home for six months and, if it does not improve, enforcement action could be taken or its registration licence to operate could be cancelled.

A spokesperson for Active Care Group, which owns John-Edwards Care Homes Ltd, said: “We were disappointed to receive this latest CQC rating, but we thank the regulator for working with us to identify areas for improvement in our service.  

“Encouragingly, the CQC acknowledged some areas of demonstrable progress at the facility since the last inspection, but clearly, we still have more to do.  

"Active Care Group has reviewed all its safeguarding procedures at the facility and introduced new procedures and senior oversight. 

“The safety and wellbeing of patients in our care is our top priority and we are taking swift action to deliver immediate improvements.”  

The special measures mean the CQC will keep the service under review and will require improvements within six months. If this does not happen then they could bring enforcement measures.

The regulator said: “At the time of our inspection there was not a registered manager in post.

"The provider had appointed a manager, but they had not submitted an application to become registered.

The last rating for this service was 'required improvement' on August 12, 2022.

“The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve. At this inspection we found the provider remained in breach of regulations,” said the CQC.

“We have identified breaches in relation to safe care and treatment, medicines management, person-centred care, safeguarding and good governance at this inspection.”