44 Stimpson Avenue

Updated 2 April 2019

The inspection:

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection checked 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.

Inspection team:

Our inspection was completed by one adult social care inspector.

Service and service type:

44 Stimpson Avenue is a care home. People in care homes receive accommodation and 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:

This comprehensive inspection took place on 05 March 2019 and 07 March 2019 and was unannounced.

What we did:

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. This included statutory notifications that the provider had sent us. A statutory notification is information about important events which the provider is required to send us by law. We sought feedback from the local authority, clinical commissioning group (CCG) and other professionals who work with the service. We used information the provider sent us in the Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually 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 two relatives to ask about their experience of the care provided. We were unable to speak directly to people using the service due to their complex needs. We spoke with five members of staff including the registered manager.

We reviewed a range of records. This included three people's care records and medication records. We also looked at three staff files around staff recruitment, various records in relation to training and supervision of staff, records relating to the management of the home and a variety of policies and procedures developed and implemented by the provider.

Updated 2 April 2019

About the service:

44 Stimpson Avenue is a residential care home that was providing residential care for 3 people with learning disabilities or autistic spectrum disorder.

People’s experience of using this service:

• People’s relatives told us they felt their relative was safe and well looked after. Relatives we spoke with gave us positive feedback about staff and the registered manager. Comments included, " I can’t fault the staff.” “The care is excellent and person centred,” and, “The managers and staff are great, they contact me every week.”

• Guidelines and procedures were detailed in outlining any risks for people and detailed the strategies in place to reduce any behaviours and how to keep people safe.

• Risks to people were regularly assessed, reviewed and safely managed.

• The provider had effective safeguarding and whistleblowing systems and policies in place.

• Staff were aware of how to recognise signs of abuse and were knowledgeable about what to do in the event of any concern being raised.

• People were supported by enough appropriately trained staff.

• Staff had been recruited by a robust process to ensure they had the right skills and attributes.

• People had care plans in place detailing how they liked to be supported.

• People received appropriate support with their medicines.

• People were supported to access healthcare professionals appropriately.

• We saw evidence of mental capacity assessments being carried out as required.

• People and relatives were fully involved in all aspects of care planning where appropriate.

• People were supported to have choice and control over their lives, by a consistent staff team who knew them well.

• Staff were clear in their roles and responsibilities.

• People could be confident that staff were trained to support them, the provider ensured staff had access to training and systems were in place to monitor staff performance.

Rating at last inspection:

GOOD (report published 15 September 2016)

Why we inspected:

This was a planned inspection based on the rating at the last inspection.

Follow up:

Going forward we will continue to monitor this service and plan to inspect in line with our reinspection schedule for those services rated Good.

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