The inspection was unannounced and took place on 24 November 2016. The service was last inspected on 5 December 2013. At that time the service was meeting the essential standards of safety and quality and no concerns were identified.

St Lucy Lodge is a small family run service for people with mental health support needs. The service supports up to five people, at the time of the inspection there were four people living there. The service is registered to provide accommodation for persons who require nursing or personal care.

During the inspection the registered manager was not available. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

People were protected from harm and abuse. There was a high level of awareness from staff and people using the service about abuse and what to do if someone was worried about themselves or somebody else in the service.

The care staff that we spoke with expressed an understanding of the scope of mental health support that people needed. We looked at training records in individual staff files and found a range of mandatory yearly training records.

Positive, caring relationships had been developed with people and staff showed that they knew the people they were supporting. People were given time to build confidence at their own pace with a long term aim to move into more independent accommodation.

There was a culture of listening to people using the service and different opportunities for people to feedback what they thought and ideas they had. The service had a complaints policy and procedure in place which outlined how people could complain and response times. People received personalised care that was responsive to their individual needs and preferences. The management and care staff involved families in support.

We saw that there was strong leadership in the care home, with motivated qualified people in management positions. There was an in depth monthly audit completed by the owner that covered the areas of safe, effective, caring, responsive and well led. Staff had regular supervision and appraisals and the records we looked at showed there were no gaps in the frequency of these, so continuous support was in place.

We spoke with two people who used this service. One of the people told us "It's a lot better than where I used to live", "We go out for walks and do exercises in the mornings" and "I am treated well by staff." The other person told us that although they would still like to be living in their former home where they had lived for many years, "the staff are very nice here."

We asked to speak with some relatives of people who used this service but only one person wished to give their consent. Their relative was only contacted by post and we therefore had insufficient time to make contact.

We spoke to a staff member about their experiences of having worked at this service. They told us "generally the service is very good" and "people have discussed my development with me".

We found that people who used this service were treated with respect and were involved in the planning and running of this service. Staff worked with people to best meet their needs at all times. An external professional we spoke to said "They are like a family to her" and "they look after her well."

We found that people who used this service did generally experience effective, safe and appropriate care, treatment and support that did meet their needs and protect their rights. We also found that people were kept safe from abuse or the risk of abuse.

We found that people were supported by sufficient numbers of staff who were competent and who had met their needs comprehensively.

There were three people living in the home at the time of our inspection. We spoke to one person. One person was out and another person did not wish to talk to us. The person we spoke to said, "I'm very happy here, I don't want to move." We read from another person's care records that they had also stated that they wanted to stay at this home.

One person told us that staff supported them with shopping and personal care and looked after their medication. They also said that staff cooked all their meals for them. This person told us, "all staff are nice."

People living in the home told us they received good care from staff whom supported them. People told us that staff helped them when they needed support.