South Essex Special Needs Housing Association Limited (SESNHA)

Updated 11 May 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

The inspection was carried out by 1 inspector and an Expert by Experience. An Expert by Experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

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 a short period notice of the inspection. This was because we needed to be sure that the provider or registered manager would be in the office to support the inspection.

Inspection activity started on 18 April 2023 and ended on 27 April 2023. We visited the location’s office on 19 April 2023.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return (PIR). This is information providers are required to send us annually with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. We used all this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with 4 people who use the service and 4 people’s relatives to seek their views on the quality of care provided. We also looked at surveys and reviews showing multiple people’s feedback on the care and support provided. A sample of electronic call monitoring data was analysed by a specialist CQC team to check visit durations and punctuality. We spoke with 7 members of staff, including the registered manager, the quality monitoring officer, senior care workers and care workers. We also sent out questionnaires to staff and received and reviewed 9 responses. We reviewed 6 people’s care plans, risk assessments and multiple medication records. We looked at a variety of documents relating to the governance and oversight of the service, including policies, procedures, staff files, meeting minutes and audits.

Updated 11 May 2023

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

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 location only provided support for a small number of people with a learning disability or autistic people, and most of these people did not receive any support with the regulated activity of personal care. 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.

About the service

South Essex Special Needs Housing Association Limited (also known as ‘SESNHA Care’) is a home care agency providing personal care to people in their own homes. The service operates in Essex across Basildon, Harlow, Castle Point and Rochford. The service provides support to people including those with a physical disability, sensory impairment, and / or those living with dementia. At the time of our inspection there were 161 people using the service.

Not everyone who used the service received personal care. 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. During this inspection, 130 people were in receipt of personal care.

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

Right Support: People were supported to be independent as possible, through reliable and safely managed care visits which were designed to meet their needs and preferences. One person said, “I try and work together with the care workers as I still want to do things, so we work as a team.” People 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 policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

Right Care: Staff received training and supervision to support them to deliver individualised and person-centred care for people. This included specialist training in supporting people with a learning disability and people living with dementia. One person told us, “I am well respected and treated with dignity.” Systems were in place to identify and respond to people’s changing needs. One person’s relative said, “The office is very good at supplying care in advance when my relative needs to go to hospital at certain times.”

Right Culture: There was an open and positive culture at the service, which embraced change, improvement and continuous development. The registered manager had a clear vision and ambition for the service, and systems and processes for governance and oversight had been developed and embedded since the last inspection. The service worked effectively in partnership with people, their relatives and other health and social care professionals to support good outcomes.

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

Rating at last inspection

Since the last inspection, the service has moved address and changed the location name from Aveley House to South Essex Special Needs Housing Association Limited. The last rating for the service under the previous name and at the previous premises was requires improvement (published 18 November 2021).

At our last inspection we recommended that the provider embeds safe recruitment practice and governance and oversight measures more widely, including analysis of themes and trends. At this inspection we found the provider had acted on these recommendations and made improvements.

Why we inspected

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

At the last inspection this service was rated as requires improvement in the key questions of safe and well-led. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe and well-led only. For those key questions not inspected, we used the ratings awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating. The overall rating for the service has changed from requires improvement to good based on the findings of this inspection.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for South Essex Special Needs Housing Association Limited on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Recommendations

We have made a recommendation about protocols for ‘as required’ medication.

Follow up

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