The Vale Residential Care Home

191 Willington Street, Maidstone, Kent, ME15 8ED

01622762332

Care Type

Residential Care

Assessment date

2 October 2025

Provider

Charing Vale Limited

Beds

28 beds

About The Vale Residential Care Home

The Vale Residential Care Home is a residential care home in Kent, providing care for older people living with dementia. Details of the CQC's most recent findings are set out below.

The Vale Residential Care Home provides residential care for up to 28 older people living with dementia, with 26 people living there at the time of assessment. The CQC found significant failings, rating the home Inadequate overall. Risks around epilepsy, choking and skin integrity were not managed safely, staffing levels were insufficient, and staff lacked knowledge of how to report safeguarding concerns.

Inspectors identified a closed culture that had not been recognised or addressed by the provider, and the home has been placed in special measures.

Some relatives described staff as kind and caring, but others raised concerns about task-focused support, staff divisions, and limited activities for people living with dementia. Governance systems had failed to identify or address these problems, and the CQC found breaches relating to safeguarding, safe care, staffing and leadership.

Source: CQC assessment, 16 January 2026

Specialist Care

DementiaOlder peopleYounger adults

Photographs of the home

Practical details from the provider

The home has a secluded garden with a patio and a conservatory.

Published on the provider's website, checked 2 October 2026. Confirm arrangements with the home before deciding.

Fees and availability

We have not verified a current weekly fee for this home. Ask for a written quote based on the room and care needed, including any extra charges.

Check current vacancies, the admission assessment and visiting arrangements directly with the home.

Care and inspection details

Checked against the CQC register on 21 September 2026. This is a check of published information, not a visit to the home.

Registered service: Care home service without nursing
Registered capacity: 28 places — this is not a vacancy count
Registration checked: Registered · ME15 8ED

Registered care categories

Caring for adults over 65 yrs; Caring for adults under 65 yrs; Dementia.

These describe the registration. The home must assess whether it can meet the individual person's needs and whether a place is available.

CQC ratings in more detail

Overall rating shown by CQC: Inadequate.

Assessment published 16 January 2026. Assessment date recorded: 2 October 2025.

Read CQC's assessment overview

The following is CQC's published account of its assessment, published 16 January 2026. References to “we” mean CQC. It describes findings at that time.

The Vale is a residential care home providing support to older people living with dementia. The service can support up to 28 people, there were 26 people living at the service at the time of the inspection. This inspection was carried out on 6 and 7 October 2025. We undertook this inspection as concerns had been received that related to safeguarding concerns.
We found that risks to people were not being well managed. Risks relating to epilepsy management, choking and skin integrity had not always been managed safely. Staff lacked knowledge on how to report incidents of concern to ensure that action could be taken to understand and mitigate risks to people. Systems and processes to ensure that safeguarding and incidents were recorded and reported appropriately were not robust. There were not sufficient staff to meet people’s needs. Governance systems had not been effective in identifying and addressing the concerns identified within this inspection.
There was a closed culture at the service. A "closed culture" is a poor culture that can lead to harm, including human rights breaches and abuse. We found a poor culture across the entire service, which had not been recognised or addressed by the provider.
We found significant shortfalls across the service and identified breaches of 4 regulations in relation to safeguarding, safe care and treatment, staffing and good governance.
This service is being placed in special measures. The purpose of special measures is to ensure that services providing inadequate care make significant improvements. Special measures provide a framework within which we user our enforcement powers in response to inadequate care and provide a timeframe within which providers must improve the quality of the care they provide. In instances 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.

Safe: Inadequate
Effective: Good
Caring: Good
Responsive: Good
Well-led: Inadequate

Questions prompted by these ratings

Safe: What changes have been made to medicines, staffing and safeguarding since this rating?
Well-led: What has changed in management, checks and oversight since this rating?

These are questions for your visit, not a claim about conditions today.

Read The Vale Residential Care Home's CQC record and reports.

Contains Care Quality Commission information under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Ratings and registration details can change after the date checked.

5 Questions to Ask on Your Visit

When visiting The Vale Residential Care Home, consider asking...

1.What specific dementia training do staff receive and how recently?
2.How do you support a resident who becomes distressed or confused?
3.How does the home keep a record of a resident's life history and personal preferences?
4.How do you involve families as dementia progresses and communication becomes harder?
5.What happens when a resident's dementia reaches an advanced stage?

5 Things to Look For on Your Visit

When you visit The Vale Residential Care Home, look out for...

1.Is the environment calm, uncluttered and easy to navigate?
2.Do staff speak to residents with patience and dignity, even if they repeat themselves?
3.Are there memory cues around the home -- photos, familiar objects, clear signage?
4.Do residents seem settled and safe, or agitated and unsupervised?
5.Is there meaningful activity happening, or are residents just sitting quietly with nothing to do?

Could the NHS fund The Vale Residential Care Home's fees?

The average nursing home costs £1,535 per week. That's £79,820 a year. NHS Continuing Healthcare could cover all of it. No means test, no contribution from you.

Find out if the NHS could fund these fees