A health watchdog has told the ellenor hospice it must improve, although it does provide outstanding end of life care.

Care Quality Commission inspectors visited the Northfleet hospice unannounced in May and found two breaches of the Health and Social Care Act.

Safe systems were in place for the ordering of medicines but there were some shortfalls in their administration and disposal. While most records were computerised, some were found to be inconsistent and contradictory.

The report, just published, says the hospice ‘Requires Improvement’ but also found plenty to praise.

The inspectors concluded: “Guidance was not in place for the use of some medicines and creams and waste medicines were not disposed of in a timely manner.

“Accurate records were not always kept with respect to each person’s individual care.”

While acknowledging that steps needed to be taken, the Care Quality Commission report said: “The service provided outstanding end-of-life care and people were enabled to experience a comfortable, dignified and pain-free death in the place of their choice when possible.

“It had received a large number of compliments concerning the kind, compassionate and outstanding caring manner of the staff team.” - CQC report

The hospice, in Coldharbour Road, offers specialist palliative care, advice and support to adults who are terminally ill and their families.

Ellenor has an in-patient unit which holds 15 patients, a hospice day service which supports 20 people and a multi-disciplinary team of staff who travel to patients’ homes which means more than 500 people are being looked after at any one time.

Claire Cardy, ellenor’s chief executive, said: “We are really delighted that the majority of the content is positive. We are really pleased that three sections have been rated as outstanding.

“These relate to how ‘caring’, ‘responsive’ and ‘effective’ we are, so it is a wonderful testament to the compassionate care we provide to patients and families that this has been recognised. Staff across the organisation were recognised as being ‘outstandingly kind, caring and compassionate’.

“The CQC has given us an overall rating of ‘Requires Improvement’. The report has helped us to identify two specific areas which we need to improve and which we are already doing by working to an agreed action plan, to ensure that we continue to provide the highest quality care.”