A CARE home has been placed in special measures after an inspection found it "extremely dirty and untidy".

Shannon Court Care Centre was rated "inadequate" in a report published by the Care Quality Commission on September 3.

In the damning report the care centre, in Radcliffe Road, The Haulgh, was deemed to not provide a safe, effective, caring or well-led service.

It was also classed as "requires improvement" in being 'responsive', which included inconsistent care plans and no meaningful one-to-one interactions between staff and service users.

The CQC report read: "On observing the premises we found them to be extremely dirty and untidy with a number of cross infection risks apparent.

"There were plastic gloves, used by staff, and continence pads left in bathrooms and on radiators."

The privacy and dignity of service users was also called into question by the CQC.

When inspectors asked one member of staff how they assisted one person with oral hygiene they were told, "They've got no teeth".

Staff levels were also found to be insufficient to meet the needs of the service users with one member of staff having said "we definitely need more staff on this unit, there are a lot of accidents and lounge areas always seem to be left unattended, which makes monitoring people difficult", while another said, "I've recently handed my notice in. I don't like the care that is given to people here".

The report also said staff had been given "little training over the last year".

The care home, which accommodates up to 78 people has a dementia residential unit but the report found it was not dementia friendly and had "little in the way of signage to help with orientation or distinctions between doors and the floor to help people".

At the last inspection on January 13, 2016 the service was meeting all requirements.

The care home will be inspected again in six months and if found not to have made sufficient improvements, enforcement procedures will begin to prevent the provider from operating the service.

In a statement prepared by Shannon Court Care Centre a spokesman said: "We acknowledge the report from the CQC.

"We have taken the feedback very seriously and since the date of inspection we have been working hard in addressing all the issues of concern that were raised.

"We immediately implemented a robust action plan which included recruiting an experienced manager and the auditing of our existing services in order to improve and sustain our standards into the future.

"This report is based on an inspection that was undertaken in July and since then we have worked hard to improve all aspects of our service.

"We will continue to work hard alongside all of our relevant authorities to ensure that we sustain these standards going forward.

"We would hope to be able to demonstrate the significant progress that we have made at our next inspection."

Debbie Westhead, Deputy Chief Inspector of Adult Social Care in the North, said:

“People are entitled to services which provide safe, effective, compassionate and high quality care.

"We found that the care provided by Shannon Court Care Centre fell a very long way short of what we expect services to provide, which is why we have intervened to keep people using this service safe.

“We were very concerned that vulnerable people using this service were not being kept safe in the most basic of ways.

"We found the centre to be extremely dirty and untidy with a number of infection risks, and a roof patio overlooking the car park had a low wall that people using the service could have fallen from or climbed over and been seriously hurt.

“We also saw that medicines were not managed safely at the service.

"On the day of our inspection we saw people being given medication in an unsafe way, as well as the incorrect storage and disposal of medicines which put people at risk of being harmed.

“We were also very concerned that the dignity and respect of people using Shannon Court Care Centre was not respected, and people were poorly presented.

“If insufficient improvements have been made such that there remains a rating of inadequate for any key question or overall, we will not hesitate to take further enforcement action.”

The full report from the inspection can be found here on our website: http://www.cqc.org.uk/location/1-916410420.