Dukes Court achieves overall ‘good’ CQC while on Northamptonshire ICN’s remote monitoring programme

Dukes Court Care Home in Wellingborough has been awarded a ‘Good’ in all areas by CQC in its recent inspection. Dukes Court is a residential care home providing accommodation and personal care for up to 60 residents and is owned by Avery Healthcare.

The team at Dukes Court Care Home have been using remote patient monitoring technology since 2021, seeing the benefits for residents and the care home team alike – one of the areas that the CQC team picked up on in their report.  Remote monitoring technology enables people to be cared for in their care home where possible, where resident observations are taken by care home staff, entered into Docobo Remotes Monitoring tablets, and then automatically transferred to a Virtual Clinical Hub where alerts are reviewed, monitored and acted on swiftly and efficiently by a team of clinicians.

NHS & Social Care through Integrated Care Northamptonshire (ICN) provides remote patient monitoring service to Dukes Court Care Home and other care homes in the area – supported by remote monitoring provider Docobo.

Among the many positive comments within the report, the inspectors fed back that ‘People and relatives told them they felt staff provided safe care and knew how to reduce risks relating to people’s safety.’ They went on to say that the pilot – which enables staff to have access to a virtual team of nurses and clinicians resulted in relatives telling the inspectors that when staff ‘contacted the virtual team of nurses due to concerns about a person’s health, the guidance given had prevented their loved one from being admitted to hospital.’

Magdalena Mazur, Home Manager at Dukes Court, says, ‘We are so happy with the CQC result – the team work so hard to achieve the best outcomes for our residents. Residents come into the care home as they don’t want to go to hospital, and they want to avoid the unnecessary hospital visits. Docobo is amazing – it gives us control from the desk to obtain information about residents. If I am not at work – I can still keep an eye on my residents, and I know my team can contact the clinical hub at any time – which is hugely appreciated by families.’

Lauren Mann, Deputy Manager, says: ‘We are delighted with the CQC result! The remote monitoring is so reassuring for my senior carers – as they have this support from clinicians. Before, we would have to wait a long time to get through to a doctor – now we just enter in the Docobo readings and we get a really quick response back from a clinician.’

Paula Love, Lead Nurse for Integrated Care Transformation and Interim Lead for the remote monitoring Virtual Clinical Care Team Hub, says: ‘This is an excellent achievement for Dukes Court!  This really shows how a collaborative approach in remote monitoring can improve the health and wellbeing of the residents and ensure they live well, stay well and age well within the community.’

Huge congratulations to the team! You can watch a video of Dukes Court and you can read the full report.

‘Docobo is amazing – it gives us control from the desk to obtain information about residents. If I am not at work - I can still keep an eye on my residents, and I know my team can contact the clinical hub at any time – which is hugely appreciated by families.’ Magdalena MazurHome Manager at Dukes Court