A north-east care home has been given a matter of days to improve standards by a watchdog.
The Care Inspectorate visited Auchtercrag Care Home in Ellon on March 12 and rated the standard of its Covid-19 care and support as weak on their six-point scale.
According to the body, 55 people were living in the home at the time of their inspection with the service being provided by Daviot Care Limited.
The subsequent report raised concerns with food and drink and also the cleanliness of some areas with dust and even food residue being seen.
The report said: “People had sufficient food and fluids brought to their rooms, however sometimes this was out of reach or people who required support to eat, and drink did not receive it.
“One person who was asleep, had their lunch placed in front of them and was left to sleep while the meal went cold. We intervened to ensure that the person received a hot meal and support to eat.
“People’s nutrition and hydration status was not appropriately monitored. We found that people regularly received significantly low levels of fluids or sometimes more than what had been recommended by professionals.
“There was no analysis of the information from these recordings and for this analysis to bring about change to the care and support. This meant that some people continued to have too little to drink. It is important for people to drink enough to help them remain healthy and well.
“Some equipment, such as shower chairs, raised toilet seats were found to have areas of corrosion. This made these difficult to clean and thus increased the risk of cross-contamination.
“The underside of tables and the arms of chairs were found to be sticky and coated with food. This demonstrated that the cleaning of these items was not robust, and this increased the risk of cross-infection.
“The laundry was found to be cluttered with boxes and baskets on the floor. Contaminated laundry waiting to be laundered had been placed on the floor of the laundry. Improvements need to be made to the organisation, storage and safe laundry practises to reduce the risk of cross-contamination.
“Improvements must be made to ensure that the environment and equipment are cleaned and maintained to reduce the risk of cross-infection and to ensure that people experience an environment that is well looked after, clean, tidy and well maintained.”
Aucthercrag Care Home has until April 5 to meet the requirements set out by the Care Inspectorate.
A spokeswoman for Auchtercrag Care Home said: “The safety and wellbeing of our residents is our highest priority so, understandably, we are disappointed that standards have fallen short.
“We immediately took action to address the points raised following the inspection and are working closely with the Care Inspectorate and the local Health and Social Care Partnership to further improve the level of compliance in the home.
“We can reassure the families of our residents that we remain focussed on ensuring everyone at Auchtercrag Care Home receives the highest standards of personalised, quality care and support.”
This article originally appeared on the Evening Express website. For more information, read about our new combined website.