Alice House

What families say

Based on 12 Google reviews · 0 reviews on carehome.co.uk · most recent 2026-04-10

The eight family priority themes

• Staff warmth72
• Compassion & dignity72
• Cleanliness70
• Activities & engagement60
• Food quality60
• Healthcare68
• Management & leadership72
• Resident happiness68

What inspectors found

Inspected 2020-02-25 · Report published 2020-02-25 · Inspected 4 times in the last three years

• Is this home safe?

  Not yet rated

  {"found":"The September 2025 inspection rated the Safe domain as Good. No specific concerns were recorded in the published findings. The home is registered for 32 beds and cares for people living with dementia, a group for whom consistent, familiar staffing and robust incident-learning processes are particularly important. The published report does not include detail on night staffing numbers, agency staff usage, falls management, or medicines administration processes.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"A Good rating for safety means inspectors found no significant failures, which is a reasonable baseline. However, our Good Practice evidence base, drawing on 61 studies, identifies night staffing as the point where safety most commonly slips in homes of this size. For a 32-bed home with a dementia specialism, you would want to know that at least two carers are present overnight and that a senior is contactable on site. The inspection findings do not confirm this either way, so this is one of the most important questions to ask directly. Agency staff reliance is a related concern: when your parent sees unfamiliar faces, particularly at night or during personal care, it can increase distress and reduce the quality of observation.","evidence_base":"The Good Practice rapid evidence review (IFF Research and Leeds Beckett University, 2026) found that night staffing ratios and agency staff dependency are among the strongest predictors of safety quality in dementia care settings. Homes with consistent permanent teams show better incident detection and faster escalation.","watch_out":"Ask the manager to show you the actual staffing rota for the past two weeks, not a template. Count how many permanent carers were on each night shift and how many shifts were covered by agency or bank staff."}

  Verified by inspectorMentioned, not assessed

• Is the care effective?

  Not yet rated

  {"found":"The Effective domain was rated Good at the September 2025 inspection. The published text does not include specific findings about care plan quality, GP access, dementia training content, medicines management, or food provision. The home's registration as a dementia specialism service means it is expected to demonstrate specific competencies in these areas, but the detail is not visible in the published summary.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"Good Practice research consistently identifies care plans as living documents that should be updated at least monthly and whenever your parent's condition changes, not filed away after admission. If your parent has dementia, their care plan should include personal history, communication preferences, what calms them when distressed, and their preferred daily routine. Food quality is one of the eight themes families mention most in positive reviews, appearing in 20.9% of weighting in our data. It is worth asking specifically about texture-modified diets if your parent has swallowing difficulties, and about whether a Speech and Language Therapist is involved when needed. The inspection gives you no information on these specifics, so they need to be explored directly.","evidence_base":"The Good Practice evidence review found that dementia-specific training, particularly content covering non-verbal communication and distress recognition, significantly improves care outcomes. Training that is refreshed annually and includes agency staff is a marker of homes with stronger effective care ratings.","watch_out":"Ask to see a care plan for a current resident, with names removed for privacy. Check whether it includes the person's life history, their preferred name, and how staff should respond if they become anxious or distressed. If the plan reads like a medical form rather than a portrait of a person, that tells you something important."}

  Verified by inspector

• Is this home caring?

  Not yet rated

  {"found":"The Caring domain was rated Good at the September 2025 inspection. Staff warmth and compassion are the two highest-weighted themes in family satisfaction data, yet the published inspection text includes no direct observations of staff interactions, no resident or family quotes, and no specific examples of how dignity and privacy are maintained. The Good rating means inspectors did not find failures, but the absence of detail limits what can be said with confidence.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"Staff warmth is the single biggest driver of family satisfaction in our review data, mentioned in 57.3% of positive reviews, with compassion and dignity close behind at 55.2%. These are not abstract qualities: they show up in whether staff knock before entering your parent's room, whether they use the name your parent prefers, and whether they sit at eye level when speaking to someone in a chair. Good Practice research emphasises that non-verbal communication matters as much as verbal communication for people with advanced dementia. Because the inspection report gives no specific examples in this area, your most important source of evidence is your own observation during a visit. Arrive at a time when care is actually happening, not just during a scheduled tour.","evidence_base":"The Good Practice evidence review found that person-led care, where staff know and use individual preferences, histories, and communication styles, is associated with significantly lower levels of distress and better wellbeing outcomes for people living with dementia. This requires staff to know the person, not just the diagnosis.","watch_out":"During your visit, watch an unscripted interaction between a staff member and a resident. Does the staff member use the resident's preferred name? Do they make eye contact? Do they move without rushing? These behaviours are more reliable indicators of a caring culture than anything you will read on a rota or brochure."}

  Verified by inspectorResident testimony recorded

• Is the home responsive?

  Not yet rated

  {"found":"The Responsive domain was rated Good at the September 2025 inspection. No specific findings about activities, one-to-one engagement, end-of-life planning, or individual care responsiveness are included in the published summary. For a home with a dementia specialism, responsiveness includes whether the environment and daily rhythm are designed around individual needs rather than institutional convenience.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"Activities and resident happiness together account for significant weight in our family satisfaction data: activities at 21.4% and resident happiness at 27.1%. For people living with dementia, Good Practice research highlights that group activities alone are not sufficient. Your parent may reach a point where they cannot easily join a group, and what matters then is whether a staff member will sit with them, look at a photograph album, fold laundry together, or do something that connects with their personal history. Ask specifically about one-to-one time. A home that can only describe its group programme is not fully responsive to advanced dementia. The inspection does not tell you whether Alice House has this in place.","evidence_base":"The Good Practice evidence review identified Montessori-based approaches and everyday household task engagement as among the most effective activity strategies for people with moderate to advanced dementia, producing measurable improvements in wellbeing and reductions in distress behaviours. These require individual knowledge of each person's history and abilities.","watch_out":"Ask the activities coordinator to describe what they would do with your parent on a day when your parent refused to join the group session and seemed withdrawn. A confident, specific answer suggests genuine individual responsiveness. A vague answer about encouraging participation suggests a group-first model."}

  Verified by inspector

• Is the home well-led?

  Not yet rated

  {"found":"The Well-led domain was rated Good at the September 2025 inspection. Mrs Laura Jane Collard is the registered manager, and Mr Oliver Sydney Kenneth Larkin is the nominated individual at provider level. The published text does not describe how long the manager has been in post, how visible she is day to day, how staff are supported to raise concerns, or how the home responds to feedback from families. These are the factors that Good Practice research most closely links to leadership quality.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"Management stability is one of the strongest predictors of quality trajectory in care homes. Our Good Practice evidence base found that homes where the registered manager has been in post for more than two years, and where staff feel able to speak up without fear, consistently perform better across safety and care quality measures. A Good rating here is encouraging, but the inspection gives you no information about manager tenure or the culture under the surface. Communication with families is weighted at 11.5% in our review data. Ask directly how the home would contact you in an emergency, how often you would receive an update on your parent's wellbeing, and whether you would be invited to your parent's care review.","evidence_base":"The Good Practice evidence review found that bottom-up empowerment, where frontline staff are encouraged and supported to raise concerns and suggest improvements, is a stronger predictor of sustained quality than top-down compliance processes alone. Manager visibility on the floor is a key observable marker.","watch_out":"Ask a care staff member, not the manager, one question: 'If you were worried about something you had seen, how would you raise it?' A confident, specific answer, naming a process or a person, suggests a culture where concerns surface. Hesitation or a vague answer about 'speaking to management' suggests the culture may be less open."}

  Verified by inspector

Source: CQC inspection report →

What the evidence base says

Against the DCC Good Practice in Dementia Care standards, this home’s evidence aligns most strongly on The team at Alice House specialises in dementia care and supports both younger adults under 65 and older residents. This mixed-age approach allows for tailored care plans that meet individual needs across different life stages.. Gaps or open questions remain on For those living with dementia, the home provides specialist support within its modernised facilities. The team works to maintain residents' abilities and comfort through individualised care approaches. — areas worth probing directly during a visit.