A DEANE care home has been told to make improvements after a CQC inspection found two female patients had “excess facial hair”.

Lyngate Care Home was rated “needs improvement” in all five categories – is the service safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led?

Some key points picked up at the inspection included two female residents had “excess facial hair”, three people had no socks or shoes on, and one patient was given medication that had been taken out of a disposal bin.

Tom Francis, manager at the home, believes the CQC has been too harsh on the home, as Bolton Council, residents, and their families are all happy with the quality of care.

Speaking about the women spotted with “excess facial hair”, he said: “We always need to minimise how much we distress people who have mental health problems or dementia.

“It’s difficult for us to address this without taking away their ability to make their own choices which can be distressing.”

“The medication being taken out of the disposal bin, we feel that was quite misrepresented and brought that up with the CQC.”

Mr Francis said the medication had been incorrectly marked for disposal under the belief that it was out of date, but a member of staff spotted the error and continued to use it in a move described as “proactive” by Mr Francis.

The report published by CQC stated that the inspector believed the service was in breach of four regulations in The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014.

Mr Francis has requested a meeting with the CQC to understand their rating and how to improve it but that request was declined.

He added: “I have to balance hands-on care with appropriate documentation and make sure that one doesn’t out-balance the other - the CQC wanted more documentation which is something I have to work on.

“We received a compliment from an anonymous family member through the CQC a few weeks ago and another last week.

“All of our feedback from everyone else has been really positive, I’m quite happy with where the home is and where we’re progressing.

“There’s always work that can be done to be better but we’re in a good place.”