The Kent Autistic Trust - 30 The Close

Updated 28 June 2019

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. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team:

The inspection was carried out by one inspector.

Service and service type:

The Kent Autistic Trust – 30 The Close is a care home without nursing. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.

Notice of inspection:

The inspection was unannounced.

What we did:

Before the inspection the provider completed a Provider Information Return. Providers are required to send us key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. This information helps support our inspections. We took this into account when we inspected the service and made the judgements in this report. We reviewed the information we held about the service including previous inspection reports. We also looked at notifications about important events that had taken place in the service, which the provider is required to tell us by law. We used all this information to plan our inspection.

People were not able to verbally express their experiences of living at the service. We observed staff interactions with people and observed care and support in communal areas. We spoke with three people’s relatives.

We contacted health and social care professionals to obtain feedback about their experience of the service. These professionals included local authority commissioners and Healthwatch. There is a local Healthwatch in every area of England. They are independent organisations who listen to people’s views and share them with those with the power to make local services better. Healthwatch told us they had not visited the service or received any comments or concerns since the last inspection. One local authority team told us that they had not been to the service to check standards of care for two years. We received positive feedback from one health and social care professional.

We spoke with nine staff including; specialist support workers, a night support worker, a senior support worker, the registered manager, other local managers, the quality and compliance manager, the nominated individual for the provider, the regional manager and a member of the provider’s positive behaviour support team.

We looked at two people’s personal records, support plans and people’s medicines charts, risk assessments, staff rotas, staff schedules, two staff recruitment records, meeting minutes, policies and procedures.

We asked the registered manager to send us additional information after the inspection. We asked for copies of the quality audits and surveys. These were received in a timely manner.

Updated 28 June 2019

About the service:

The Kent Autistic Trust – 30 The Close is a small care home for up to six people with learning disabilities and/or autistic spectrum disorder aged 18 years and over. There were four people living at the service at the time of inspection.

The service has been developed and designed in line with the principles and values that underpin Registering the Right Support and other best practice guidance. This ensures that people who use the service can live as full a life as possible and achieve the best possible outcomes. The principles reflect the need for people with learning disabilities and/or autism to live meaningful lives that include control, choice, and independence. People using the service receive planned and co-ordinated person-centred support that is appropriate and inclusive for them.

People’s experience of using this service:

The outcomes for people using the service reflected the principles and values of Registering the Right Support in the following ways; staff recognised that people had the capacity to make day to day choices and supported them to do so. People were encouraged to be independent. People were engaging in the community, for example using their local community to utilise ordinary community resources, shops, access leisure activities and to access day services and recreational activities to ensure they had a good day. People were also supported to take holidays.

The provider and staff were very responsive and worked continuously to make improvements to the service and provide people with high quality care. The provider and staff demonstrated a detailed knowledge of the people they supported and over time had developed trusting relationships with them, so that people felt safe receiving support. The provider had been responsive to people’s needs and had supported people with understanding and processing the death of loved ones in a way they understood. Staff had recognised that people were unhappy in some situations and had supported them to make positive changes to their environment which resulted in people being happy. People were happy and smiling, relatives were very happy with the service. One relative said, “We are very happy. He is very happy and they take good care of him.”

The service was well-led. The management team knew people very well, the registered manager spent time on shift working with people and staff. The management team carried out the appropriate checks to ensure that the quality of the service was continuously reviewed, improved and evolved to meet people’s changing needs. The provider promoted an open culture and was a visible presence in the service, staff felt supported by the provider and the registered manager, they felt listened to and valued. Relatives were surveyed for their views and felt these were acted upon. The provider had a strong set of values that were embedded into each staff member's practice and the way the service was managed. Staff were committed and proud of the service.

Staff were well trained and received consistent support and guidance. For people, this meant that they were always placed at the heart of decisions about the way in which they received support. Support plans guided staff in the support they provided to people in accordance with their needs and preferences. People were provided with individualised care and support as well as activities both in the service and in the community to keep them occupied and stimulated. A relative told us, “Staff are experienced and have a good knowledge of autism.”

People received a safe service and were protected from harm, staff had a detailed understanding of individual risks and danger for each person. Staff understood the measures in place to keep people safe. People were supported by enough staff with the right skills and knowledge to understand their needs and provide support in a person-centred way. The provider took care in their selection of staff, and all required checks helped ensure they were recruited safely.

People were involved in food shopping, planning their menu and where possible the preparation of food and cooking. People were encouraged and supported to be as independent as possible. People were supported to access routine and specialist healthcare appointments when they needed to.

The service continued to provide effective and safe support to people living with a learning disability and or autism. People were provided with good support to communicate, staff knew people well and understood their communication. People were supported to manage their emotions and had positive behaviour support strategies in place. Relatives told us that they had seen a positive change in their loved ones. People were supported to feedback on their experiences and contribute to planning their own support in ways which were suitable for their communication needs. For example, through using pictures, stories, signing and electronic communication.

Staff treated people with dignity and respected their privacy. Staff communicated well with relatives and welcomed them into the service, and sought their feedback about the service, which relatives felt was listened to and acted upon.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

The service met the characteristics of Good in all areas. For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection:

The service was rated Good at the last inspection on 06 September 2016 (the report was published on 28 October 2016).

Why we inspected:

This inspection was a scheduled inspection based on previous rating.

Follow up:

We will visit the service again in the future to check if there are changes to the quality of the service.