RESIDENTS at a nursing home in East Lothian suffered “significant” weight loss over one month due to a lack of oversight and management of food and fluid intake, it has been revealed.

A damning report into conditions at Drummohr Nursing Home, Wallyford, revealed 19 residents lost weight in March, with inspectors reporting some meals going cold and others eating nothing, while one resident was observed walking around taking other residents meals and drinks.

Five of those who lost weight suffered a “significant loss”, according to the report by the Care Inspectorate officers who visited the home during an unannounced three-day inspection in May.

East Lothian Health and Social Care Partnership confirmed it had suspended admission to the home following the report, which has now been fully revealed, after it emerged last month the home had been ordered to make urgent improvements after inspectors raised “serious concerns”.

HC-One, which operates the home, says it has introduced a new home manager and it pointed to some of the more “positive” comments in the report which acknowledged staff were praised for their approach to residents.

A spokesperson for HC-One said: “The health and wellbeing of our residents is our highest priority and we take all feedback from the Care Inspectorate extremely seriously. We are pleased their full report included some positive comments about the home, particularly noting our staff team are ‘kind and caring’ in their approach to residents.

“We also recognise we need to do better in some other areas. To do this, we have a new home manager in place who is being supported by the wider management team, and we continue to work closely with the Care Inspectorate and relevant authorities as we implement our improvement plan.

“We are pleased significant positive progress has already been made, and are confident the home is in a better place than at the time of the original inspection.

“We will continue working hard each and every day so that we are consistently providing the standard of care that Residents deserve.

“The Care Inspectorate have recently returned to the home to commence a new inspection, and we look forward to demonstrating the positive changes to them.”

Drummohr is the second nursing home in East Lothian operated by HC-One to have admissions suspended in two years.

In 2016, Tranent Care Home was temporarily stopped from admitting new residents by the partnership, which oversees adult care services, after reports of residents being ignored as they asked for help to eat, with others eating with their fingers because of a lack of cutlery or being unable to cut their food themselves, while others were seen wearing clothes soiled or left unchanged after spilling food on themselves.

The report into Drummohr said: “There was a lack of oversight and management of food and fluid intake in the home. Nineteen residents were recorded as having lost weight in March 2018. Five had significant weight loss.

“We observed instances where residents did not take their meal and nothing else was offered, teas were often left cold and untouched and one resident walked around taking others’ meals and drinks.

“We also noted that there was specific guidance in a care file from the dietician in respect of food and fluids that one resident could have. The instructions were not followed. These issues, together with the lack of guidance to staff in respect of monitoring, recording and evaluating intake, is concerning.”

The report added that “some of this lack of care could be attributed to a lack of staff”.

Drummohr scored a 2 out of 5 on all four areas inspected, a score regarded as ‘weak’. The four areas were quality of care and support; environment; staffing; and management and leadership.

An East Lothian Health and Social Care Partnership spokesperson said: “The wellbeing of residents is always our paramount concern and in this case we will continue working closely with Care Inspectorate to ensure that HC-One delivers the required improvements as soon as possible.

“As an interim measure, we have decided to suspend new admissions to Drummohr to enable staff there to focus on what needs to be done. They will be supported in this by a multi-disciplinary team from the partnership.”