Care Wisdom Services Ltd

Updated 5 January 2023

The inspection

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Inspection team

This inspection was carried out by 1 inspector.

Service and service type

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats.

Registered Manager

This provider is required to have a registered manager to oversee the delivery of regulated activities at this location. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Registered managers and providers are legally responsible for how the service is run, for the quality and safety of the care provided and compliance with regulations.

At the time of our inspection there was a registered manager in post.

Notice of inspection

We gave the service 5 days' notice of the inspection. This was because it is a small service and we needed to be sure that the provider or registered manager would be in the office to support the inspection.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service.

The provider was not asked to complete a Provider Information Return (PIR) prior to this inspection. A PIR is information providers send us to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make.

We used all this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with the registered manager who is also the nominated individual.

The nominated individual is responsible for supervising the management of the service on behalf of the provider. We reviewed a range of records including care records, risk assessments and staff files and other records in relation to the management of the service.

We also spoke to 1 member of staff, the person using the service and their representative.

Updated 5 January 2023

About the service

Care Wisdom is a domiciliary care agency that provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats in the community. CQC only inspects where people receive personal care. This is help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do, we also consider any wider social care provided. At the time of our inspection there was 1 person using the service.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

There were outdated policies in place with regards to safeguarding and complaints however, staff knew how to raise a concern if they had any. The person using the service, or their representatives were unaware of how to raise any concern or complaint. After the inspection, policies on safeguarding and complaints were updated to reflect correct information on how to raise concerns and to who.

There were no current quality assurance processes in place, the service had not been operating for very long so there was not enough evidence to see how effective governance processes will be. The provider had not collected sufficient information with regards to recruitment to ensure they were employing staff that were of good character and meet the requirements of the role. Following the inspection, the provider had ensured that the required information would be collected and recorded.

The person using the service received care and support specific to their needs and wishes. The person’s choices were respected, and staff involved the person in decisions in relation to the care and support being delivered. Staff had access to the person’s care and support plan which detailed the level of support required.

Staff recorded the person’s food and drink so that everyone involved in the person’s care were aware they had sufficient fluid and nutrition during the hours they were supported.

The person was supported by the same core staff and this enabled them to build a positive rapport with staff. Staff and the person were aware of how to raise concerns if they felt the need to do so.

The person told us they were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests, the systems in the service supported this practice.

We expect health and social care providers to guarantee people with a learning disability and autistic people respect, equality, dignity, choices and independence and good access to local communities that most people take for granted. ‘Right support, right care, right culture’ is the guidance CQC follows to make assessments and judgements about services supporting people with a learning disability and autistic people and providers must have regard to it.

At the time of the inspection, the provider did not care or support for anyone with a learning disability or an autistic person. However, we assessed the care provision under Right Support, Right Care, Right Culture, as it is registered as a specialist service for this population group.

People were satisfied with the care and support received from staff and had positive things to say about the staff. However, as the service had only been operating for 8 weeks at the time of this inspection, we were unable to obtain sufficient information and evidence of consistent good practice to rate the service at this time.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection and update

This service was registered with us on 05 February 2021 and began operating on the 03 October 2022 and this is the first inspection.

Why we inspected

This inspection was prompted by a review of the information we held about this service.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.