A WHITEHAVEN nursing home has been found "inadequate'' following an unannounced inspection.

Bethel House, of St Bees Road, provides for 62 people with dementia or other mental health needs. 

In a report by the Care Quality Commission, inspectors found the service to be inadequate in areas of leadership and effectiveness, and required improvement in areas of safety, caring and responsibility.

Inspectors, who had received two anonymous complaints, visited Bethel House in August and spoke to numerous staff, people who used the services and relatives.

The report stated the home had experience problems with recruitment and retention of staff, and it didn't have a registered manager.      

Inspectors said Bethel House needed to improve the way people received good levels of nutrition and hydration, medication was not correctly recorded, its training was inconsistent, the home's environment needed to be upgraded, and some care plans were out of date.

They also said staff did not always talk about people in a "dignified and respectful way'' and some of the support given to people did not promote their dignity.

However, the report stated End of Life care was "managed appropriately,'' people were encouraged to join in with activities and outings, and complaints were dealt with appropriately.

Subsequently, the inspectors have asked the home to send a report on the action to be taken to improve the services. These included looking at the safer management of medication, nutrition and hydration, equipment and environment as well as "the undignified and disrespect care and treatment''.

In the report, inspectors said: "Staff had worked hard to keep the home running as best they could but we judged that they have lost sight of some of the values during the preceding months when the management of the home had been under some pressure due to staff lack of resources and the inability to recruit qualified nursing staff.

"We spoke to staff about the values in the home. Staff could talk at some length about values in caring for vulnerable people. However we had evidence to show that some practices in the home did not promote things like dignity or rights.''

The Whitehaven News approached Haven Care Centre Ltd, which runs Bethel House, but they declined to comment on the report.