Archived: Parkhouses Independent Living Services

Updated 23 October 2018

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

This was a comprehensive inspection which took place on 24 September 2018 and was announced. We gave the service 24 hours’ notice of the inspection visit because it is small and the manager is often out of the office supporting staff or providing care. We needed to be sure that they would be in.

This inspection was conducted by one adult social care inspector.

Before the inspection, the provider completed a Provider Information Return (PIR). This is a form the provider completes to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. The provider returned the PIR within the agreed timeframe and we took the information provided into account when we made the judgements in this report.

In preparation for our inspection we gathered feedback from health and social care professionals who visited the service. We also reviewed the information we held about the service and the provider. This included any feedback from people and the previous inspection report.

We visited one property with people’s permission to observe how people were supported in their own home. We spoke to four people during the home visit. We observed their interactions with staff. We spoke to three care staff face to face and received email feedback from two staff. We spoke with the registered manager who is also the nominated individual and the office manager.

We looked at the care records of three people who used the service, training and three recruitment records of staff members and records relating to the management of the service. We also contacted the safeguarding department at the local authority and other health and social care professionals to ask them about their opinion of the service.

Updated 23 October 2018

This inspection took place on 24 September 2018.

Parkhouses Independent Living Services is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats in the community. Not everyone using Parkhouses Independent Living Services receives a regulated activity. CQC only inspects the service being received by people provided with ‘personal care’; help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do, we also take into account any wider social care provided.

At the time of our inspection the service was providing personal care to 14 people. Four of the people supported lived in a shared house with 24-hour support from care staff.

At our last inspection we rated the service good. At this inspection we found the evidence continued to support the rating of good and there was no evidence or information from our inspection and ongoing monitoring that demonstrated serious risks or concerns. This inspection report is written in a shorter format because our overall rating of the service has not changed since our last inspection.

People and their relatives were involved in discussions and decisions about the care and support needed and they could influence the delivery of their care. People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and their healthcare needs were monitored as appropriate. However, people’s ability to make decisions had not been formally assessed or documented to show which decisions they could or could not make. Improvements were required to the processes for assessing people’s mental capacity. We made a recommendation about mental capacity assessments.

People who used the service and their relatives told us they felt safe when staff members were in their homes. Staff had received training in safeguarding and knew their responsibilities to report any concerns. The service also had whistleblowing and lone working policies in place.

Risk assessments were in place to keep people safe. These were reviewed and updated regularly or when changes occurred.

Recruitment systems and processes in place were robust. We saw references, identity checks and Disclosure and Barring Service checks were completed before staff were employed.

New staff members were expected to complete an induction when they commenced employment. Training courses were available to staff which were relevant to their roles. Staff members told us, and records confirmed, that staff members received supervision and appraisals on a regular basis. Staff members we spoke with told us they were able to discuss any training requirements they had.

Our observations and feedback provided by people showed that staff were kind, caring and supportive of people who used the service.

The service delivered person centred care. We saw person centred care plans were in place and reviewed regularly.

The service had a complaints procedure in place. One complaint had been received since our last inspection.

Accidents and incidents were reported to management. This meant they were able to see if appropriate action had been taken by staff to ensure people were kept safe.

The registered manager had processes and systems in place to monitor and improve the quality of the service.

We saw regular staff meetings were also held. Staff told us they were able to bring up topics for discussion.

The service was meeting all relevant fundamental standards.

Further information is in the detailed findings below.