Orangery Care Home

What families say

Relatives describe seeing their loved ones come alive again here, taking part in activities they'd previously avoided. The team shows real compassion during difficult times, creating meaningful moments that families treasure.

Based on 16 Google reviews · 0 reviews on carehome.co.uk · most recent 2026-04-10

The eight family priority themes

• Staff warmth55
• Compassion & dignity55
• Cleanliness55
• Activities & engagement50
• Food quality50
• Healthcare55
• Management & leadership65
• Resident happiness55

What inspectors found

Inspected 2018-05-05 · Report published 2018-05-05 · Inspected 2 times in the last three years

• Is this home safe?

  Good

  {"found":"The safe domain was rated Good at the April 2018 inspection. The published report does not include specific detail about staffing ratios, medicines management, falls monitoring, infection control practices, or agency staff use. The home moved up from Requires Improvement, which suggests previous safety concerns were addressed before the inspection took place. No specific inspector observations or resident testimony about safety are available in the published text.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"A Good rating in safety after a period of Requires Improvement tells you the home identified problems and fixed them, which is actually a positive sign about how leadership responds to challenge. However, the Good Practice evidence base consistently identifies night staffing as the point where safety most often slips in care homes. With 60 beds and a dementia specialism, you need to know exactly how many staff are on duty after 8pm and what the nursing cover looks like overnight. The inspection gives you no answer to that question, so you will need to ask directly.","evidence_base":"The IFF Research and Leeds Beckett rapid evidence review found that safety incidents, particularly falls and medication errors, are most likely to occur during night shifts and weekends when staffing is thinnest. A Good overall rating does not guarantee adequate night cover.","watch_out":"Ask the manager to show you the actual staffing rota for last week, not the template. Count how many permanent carers and how many nurses were on duty overnight across the 60-bed home, and ask how many of those shifts were filled by agency staff."}

  Verified by inspectorMentioned, not assessed

• Is the care effective?

  Good

  {"found":"The effective domain was rated Good at the April 2018 inspection. The published text does not include specific information about care plan quality, GP access arrangements, dementia training content, food provision, or how staff skills are assessed. The home is registered as a nursing home with a dementia specialism, which means qualified nurses should be present around the clock, but the inspection provides no detail to confirm this in practice.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"For a parent with dementia, effectiveness is about whether the people caring for them actually understand the condition and have the skills to act on that understanding. Our Good Practice evidence base identifies care plans as living documents that should be updated regularly and shaped by family input, not written once on admission and filed away. The inspection does not tell us whether this home meets that standard. Food quality is also a marker that families consistently mention in our review data (it appears in 20.9% of positive reviews), and there is nothing in the published findings about what or how your parent would be fed.","evidence_base":"The Leeds Beckett rapid evidence review found that dementia-specific training, including non-verbal communication and behavioural understanding, is strongly associated with better outcomes for people living with dementia. Generic care training is not sufficient on its own.","watch_out":"Ask the manager what dementia training all staff, including bank and agency workers, complete before they work on the dementia unit. Ask to see an example of a completed care plan and check whether it records the person's preferred name, daily routines, food preferences, and life history."}

  Verified by inspector

• Is this home caring?

  Good

  {"found":"The caring domain was rated Good at the April 2018 inspection. The published text contains no specific observations of staff interactions, no quotes from residents or relatives about how they feel treated, and no detail about how dignity and privacy are maintained in practice. Staff warmth and compassion are the two most important themes in our family review data, accounting for 57.3% and 55.2% of positive reviews respectively, but the inspection gives us nothing specific to assess here.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"Staff warmth is the single biggest driver of family satisfaction across the 3,602 positive reviews in our data set. What families describe in those reviews are small, specific things: a carer who uses Mum's preferred name without being reminded, staff who sit down rather than stand over a resident, and unhurried personal care. The inspection tells us the home achieved Good in this domain but gives us no detail about what inspectors actually observed. This means you need to gather this evidence yourself on a visit, watching how staff interact in corridors and communal areas when they do not know they are being observed.","evidence_base":"The Good Practice evidence base highlights that non-verbal communication is as important as verbal communication in dementia care. Staff who crouch to eye level, make calm eye contact, and move at the resident's pace produce measurably better outcomes than those who interact at a task-focused pace.","watch_out":"During your visit, watch what happens when a staff member passes a resident in the corridor or communal lounge. Do they stop, make eye contact, and speak by name? Or do they walk past without acknowledgement? This unscripted moment tells you more about the culture than any policy document."}

  Verified by inspectorResident testimony recorded

• Is the home responsive?

  Good

  {"found":"The responsive domain was rated Good at the April 2018 inspection. The published text contains no specific information about the activities programme, how the home tailors engagement to individual residents, how complaints are handled, or what end-of-life care looks like. There is no mention of whether one-to-one activities are available for residents who cannot join group sessions, which is a particular concern for people in the later stages of dementia.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"Activities and engagement appear in 21.4% of positive family reviews, and resident happiness in 27.1%. For a parent with dementia, the question is not whether there is a weekly timetable on the noticeboard but whether someone will sit with your mum on a Tuesday afternoon when she cannot join the group session. The Good Practice evidence identifies individual, tailored activities, including familiar household tasks and sensory engagement, as producing significantly better outcomes than group-only provision. The inspection does not tell us whether this home offers that level of individual attention.","evidence_base":"The Leeds Beckett rapid evidence review found that Montessori-based approaches and everyday household task participation reduce agitation and improve wellbeing in people with dementia more reliably than structured group activities alone.","watch_out":"Ask to see the activity records from last week, not the planned timetable. Check whether any one-to-one sessions are recorded, who delivered them, and how long they lasted. If the records show only group sessions, ask what happens for a resident who is having a difficult day and cannot take part."}

  Verified by inspector

• Is the home well-led?

  Good

  {"found":"The well-led domain was rated Good at the April 2018 inspection. A registered manager, Mrs Dafinka Valcheva Aleksandrova, was named in the inspection record, alongside a nominated individual, Mr Swarup Singh Khadka. The home is operated by Jasmine Care Holdings Limited. The published text provides no further detail about management visibility, staff culture, governance systems, or how the home responds to complaints and incidents. The improvement from Requires Improvement suggests that leadership addressed earlier concerns effectively.","quotes":[],"family_meaning":"Management stability is one of the strongest predictors of consistent quality in care homes, according to our Good Practice evidence base. A home that improved from Requires Improvement to Good has demonstrated that its leadership can identify problems and respond to them, which matters. However, the inspection is now several years old, and leadership can change. Our review data shows that family communication (mentioned in 11.5% of positive reviews) is a key indicator of whether management prioritises transparency. You need to find out whether the same manager is still in post and what has changed since 2018.","evidence_base":"The IFF Research rapid evidence review found that leadership stability, specifically a manager who is visible on the floor and known by name to both residents and staff, is one of the most reliable predictors of sustained quality in care homes over time.","watch_out":"Ask directly whether Mrs Dafinka Valcheva Aleksandrova is still the registered manager and how long she has been in post. Then ask: if your parent had a fall or a difficult night, who would call you, when, and what would they tell you? The answer will show you how the home thinks about family communication in practice."}

  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 home cares for adults both under and over 65, with dementia listed as a key specialism.. Gaps or open questions remain on For those living with dementia, the team focuses on maintaining connections and encouraging participation in daily life, from seasonal celebrations to simple social moments. — areas worth probing directly during a visit.