A TIVERTON care home is appealing a report which has said their service still needs improvement.

The new report from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) found that, since Ashdowne’s last inspection, improvements had been made but that there needed to be more evidence of long term change.

Aris Pradhan, director at Ashdowne Care Limited, said: “We know the report has come through, and we are not happy. We have appealed that rating.”

Kate Ley, manager at Ashdowne Care Centre, said: “Part of the CQC comments are that they wanted to see long term improvements in some areas.

“Lots of improvements have been made but a lot of it is sustaining that.

“It was a positive report. We have worked hard to make those improvements and will work to continue it.”

The report commended efforts to better the responsiveness, management and effectiveness of the service.

When addressing the question “Is the service effective?”, the report said: “While improvements had been made we have not revised the rating for this key question; to improve the rating to ‘Good’ would require a longer term track record of consistent good practice.

“We will review our rating for effective at the next comprehensive inspection.”

This long term improvement will be gauged by another report in a few months.

Despite not upgrading the care centre’s rating, the inspector did note a number of improvements had been made.

“We found that action had been taken to improve the effectiveness of the service,” the report added.

“Staff had undergone training and were working towards having the knowledge and skills they needed to support people’s care and treatment needs.

“New staff had received effective inductions which had been clearly documented.

“The registered manager and staff had an understanding of the principles of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and Deprivation of Liberty safeguards.

“People living at the home had prompt access to healthcare services.

“This meant that the provider was now meeting legal requirements.”

When directly addressing Ashdowne’s responsiveness, the report said that “action had been taken to improve the responsiveness to people’s needs at the service.”

This area was rated as good, as was the care home’s ability to be caring and well-led.

This is the first year that the CQC have started new changes to their inspections.

Kate Ley added: “CQC are certainly inspecting at a much higher at a much higher standard.”