A NEWPORT council-run care home hit by two damning inspection reports has been dubbed a service of concern by inspectors.

The alarm was raised at Parklands Residential Home in Malpas after the Care and Social Services Inspectorate Wales found the service failed to ensure the health, safety and wellbeing of residents and wasn't properly staffed.

Reports detailed accounts of a resident verbally abusing others in the home - and found that the health of people living there deteriorated following delays in seeking medical advice.

Top officials at Newport council have expressed regret and say they are doing everything they can to prevent it happening in future.

But the CSSIW say it isn’t happy that enough progress has been achieved.

Parklands Residential Home, which currently has 20 residents, was subject to an inspection in January and another in February.

The January inspection found six issues of “non-compliance” which need improvement – claiming that the home failed to ensure the health, safety and wellbeing of people using the service because of a lack of robust planning, risk assessment and review.

The CSSIW said there were insufficient numbers of suitably skilled staff to meet the needs and preferences of people using the service.

A further inspection in February found two improvements – including that the registered manager was provided with more time to manage the home – but CSSIW listed a further issue of non-compliance, saying people weren’t provided with sufficient activities to meet their needs.

In January the CSSIW found evidence of a service user being verbally aggressive to fellow residents and were told by the registered manager that mealtimes were often disrupted by residents' behaviour.

But there was a lack of "effective and timely action" to address the concerns of residents that resulted, the report into the inspection says.

“It was evident that the disruptive and challenging behaviour shown by some people was affecting the comfort and wellbeing of others,” the report said.

Staff informed the CSSIW they didn’t have the right training to work with people with challenging behaviour and complex mental health needs.

“Staff told us that they experienced difficulty at times in providing the level of care needed by the high number of people with mental health needs and the registered manager informed us she was trying to access additional training for staff,” the report said.

People couldn’t be entirely confident their dignity and privacy would be maintained, inspectors said, citing one case where a resident, who neglected their own personal hygiene, insisted on sleeping in the communal areas.

The CSSIW found delays in accessing advice from health care professionals, which resulted in an avoidable deterioration in people’s mental and physical health.

A report on the second inspection in February said the need for additional training was confirmed by one staff member who said no-one at the home had mental health needs.

Daily records for two residents at the last inspection showed there were periods of over a week when they hadn’t had a bath or a shower, a report for that inspection said.

The home is registered to provide personal care to 32 people aged 65 or older, with five people between 18 and 64 years, but has been home to a wide-range of people with physical and psychological needs.

This wasn’t in accordance with the home’s conditions of registration or statement of purpose, inspectors wrote.

A spokeswoman from CSSIW said the agency had identified Parklands as a ‘service of concern’ following an unannounced inspection in January.

“This and a subsequent inspection identified a number of concerns about the standards of care at the home. We are not satisfied that sufficient progress is being achieved and are working with Newport City Council to ensure that the care and safety of residents at the home is safeguarded,” she said.

A joint statement from Newport council cabinet member for social care and well-being Paul Cockeram and strategic director for people Mike Nicholson said the authority took CSSIW’s concerns “extremely seriously”.

They said: “We regret that the quality of care has been brought into question but we are doing everything possible to prevent this happening again in the future.”

Following CSSIW’s visit the council instigated its own action plan and “will continue to make significant improvements to the quality of care", the statement read.

Relatives and representatives of the residents were informed of the situation at the time and have been invited to meet officers to share their views, concerns and answer questions, according to the authority.

“We are continuing to work with the CSSIW to actively and urgently address the issues it identified,” the statement added.