Dozens of care homes and agencies shut as CQC vows to get tough

Regulatory action in the last 12 months led to the closure of 34 care homes and eight agencies providing care in people’s homes, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) has revealed.

Some 700 elderly people and younger adults with a disability were found alternative care homes as a result.

The CQC issued legal notices to close six of the services, while in the other cases the owners either shut down or sold their operation after the regulator’s enforcement action.

The Commission said its concerns had included:

• verbal and psychological abuse of residents
• medicines not being managed safely, leaving people at risk of not receiving vital medication
• lack of medical and nursing care
• staff not legally able to work in the country
• poor sanitary conditions
• lack of staff training

A further 51 services – including 39 care homes, 11 agencies providing care in people’s homes and one agency providing nursery care – closed voluntarily after they were handed a “poor” rating by the CQC. In these cases the CQC had demanded improvements but not taken enforcement action.

The watchdog stressed that the vast majority of the 24,000 services in England provide good care and are responsive to its recommendations for improvement.

The CQC’s new registration system – under the Health and Social Care Act 2008 – launches tomorrow (1 October), bringing with it new standards of quality and safety. All care homes must be registered with the commission from this date.

The Commission insisted that the new regime would be tougher on poor care. Its wider enforcement powers include on-the-spot fines, warning notices and suspension of registration, as well as prosecution and closure.

Cynthia Bower, CQC’s chief executive, said: “Standards across the sector are improving year-on-year, so people are getting better care than in the past. In order to keep this trend going, we need to address the worst services that just cannot or will not improve to an acceptable level. This is where we’ve been focusing our attention over the past year as we get the sector ready for a new registration system that will be even tougher when care is not up to scratch.”

She insisted that closing a care home was not a decision taken lightly, but said that, in some cases, the necessary improvements fail to materialise. “It becomes clear that the only way to properly protect residents is to close the home and move them to others where care is of a better standard,” Bower said.

The CQC chief executive warned that services where problems have been identified “can expect frequent inspections”.

The new registration system will bring the NHS, private healthcare and adult social care providers under the same inspection regime and standards for the first time. NHS trusts registered in April this year and private healthcare and adult social care will join from tomorrow.

Dentists and private ambulances will register from April 2011, while GPs will need to register from 2012.