TWO Kingswinford care homes have been warned by inspectors that they need to improve - with one told that its system for giving residents their medicines was not safe.

Oaklands Care Home, in Wartell Bank, has been rated as "inadequate" for safety by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and told to improve its leadership.

Meanwhile, Highfield Residential Home, in Stream Road, has been ordered to pull its socks up all round.

CQC inspectors were concerned that the arrangements for managing medicines at Oaklands, which is a nursing home, were "not robust" following an unannounced visit last October, when 31 people were living there.

That inspection followed concerns raised by Dudley Clinical Commissioning Group about medicines management at Oaklands, which is registered for up to 40 residents.

And a follow-up CQC visit in May this year found the home's owners, Cotdean Nursing Homes Ltd, had not yet taken the appropriate action to meet the legal requirements.

A report by the commission about its inspection in October says: "We observed that people did not always receive their medication in a timely manner and records in relation to the administration of medicines had omissions that were not accounted for."

The CQC follow-up inspection in May found that appropriate action to meet legal requirements over medication management had still not been taken - so it rated Oaklands as "inadequate" for safety of service.

The home is also told it must improve its leadership - but the CQC has rated all other aspects of the Oaklands service as "good".

Jane Nunn, a director of Oaklands' owners Cotdean, said the medicines management issues had been "corrected" within a few days of the last inspection and that if the CQC inspectors returned now they would find "everything in order".

"Our home has been running for a very long time and has had an excellent manager who has worked there for almost 20 years," said Mrs Nunn.

"We have been working in conjunction with the CQC and anything that was raised was corrected.

"We had put a deputy manager in post just before the inspection and our home manager now does weekly audits of medicines management.

"It's a lovely home and everybody is invited to look at it at any time."

The Highfield residential home, which caters for people with dementia, learning disabilities and mental health conditions, has been rated as requiring improvement for safety, effectiveness, caring, responsiveness and leadership following an unannounced inspection on May 12 and 13.

The home is registered to provide accommodation and personal care for up to 13 people - but at the time of the inspection it had 11 residents - and it also provides personal care in the community.

The CQC report on Highfield said people told inspectors they felt safe at the home but added that the care provider's capacity to identify and reduce risks, such as people falling, was limited.

Other alleged faults were found with induction and training of staff, systems for checking medications, involving service users in planning aspects of their care and assessing how to support people's independence.

A member of staff at the Highfield home, who refused to give their name, said: "We have no comment as we have only just received the inspection report and have not had time to see if we agree with what it said."