The Mill House

The following is CQC's published account of its assessment, published 11 July 2025. References to “we” mean CQC. It describes findings at that time.

We completed assessment visits to The Mill House on 14 and 15 April 2025. This is a service for providing nursing and residential care to adults and older people living with dementia. At the time of our inspection the service was full at 45 people living at the service, with 3 people in hospital. At our last inspection completed in July 2019, the service was rated good overall, with requires improvement for safe.

At this inspection, we identified some areas of the service had deteriorated, and breaches of the regulations were identified in relation to the provision of safe care and treatment, and good governance. Where CQC have decided to take civil or criminal enforcement action against a provider, we will publish this information on our website after any representations and/ or appeals have been concluded.

We identified shortfalls in the quality and content of people’s care and support records, which increased the risk of inaccurate information being followed by staff, particularly unfamiliar staff such as agency. People were living with complex conditions and nursing care needs, and were not all able to make staff aware of their needs, or manage their safety independently.

We found areas of risk within the care environment the provider’s own audits and safety checks had not identified, including access to unsecured drink thickener, denture cleaning tablets and prescribed creams placing people, particularly those living with dementia at risk. Whilst the provider responded promptly to our inspection findings, changes within the care environment would not have happened without these concerns being brought to their attention. We identified shortfalls in the service’s oversight of people’s individual risk, and the wider impact this had on the assessed dependency levels and overall risk profile within the service.

As an outcome of our inspection, we made a referral to Norfolk Fire and Resue Service, who visited the service and gave advice to the provider and sourced their own assurances.