Meadows Homecare Services

Updated 17 November 2017

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 announced inspection took place on 18 and 19 October 2017. The inspection was carried out by an inspection manager and an inspector. The inspection was announced so that we could be sure that the manager and staff would be available.

Before the inspection, the provider completed a Provider Information Return (PIR). This is a form that asks the provider to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We looked at this and other information we hold about the service. This included information from notifications received by us. A notification is information about important events which the provider is required to send to us by law. Before the inspection we asked for information from representatives of several local authority contracts monitoring teams, social workers, the local authority safeguarding team, and healthwatch to aid us with planning this inspection.

During the inspection we spoke with four relatives of people who used the service, by telephone; the area operations manager; a senior care worker; and two care workers. We looked at three people’s care records and records in relation to the management of the service; management of staff; and the management of people’s medicines. We also looked at compliments and complaints received; staff training records and three staff recruitment files.

Updated 17 November 2017

Meadows Homecare Services is a domiciliary care agency registered to provide personal care for people living in their own homes. They specialise in offering 24 hour ‘live in’ care support. This means that there are staff supporting people 24 hours a day, seven days a week. There were 15 people being supported with the regulated activity of personal care at the time of our inspection.

The registered manager for this service was not in post and not managing the regulatory activities at this location at the time of the inspection. However, they were still a registered manager on our register at the time. Arrangements had been made to cancel their registration with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and an area operations manager was overseeing the day-to-day running of the service. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

This inspection was carried out on 18 and 19 October 2017 and was an announced inspection. At the last inspection on 21, 22, and 23 October 2015, the service was rated as ‘good.’ At this inspection we found the service remained ‘good.’

The CQC is required by law to monitor the operation of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA) and report on what we find. Staff were able to demonstrate an adequate understanding of the MCA to ensure that people did not have their freedom restricted in an unlawful manner. 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.

People had individualised health, care and support plans in place which recorded their needs. These plans prompted staff on any assistance a person may require and how they would like the support to be given. Individual risks to people were identified and assessed by staff. Plans were put into place to minimise these risks as far as practicable to enable people to live an independent and safe a life as possible. Arrangements were in place to make sure that people, who required this support, were assisted by staff with the safe management of their prescribed medication.

People were assisted to access a range of external health care professionals and were supported to maintain their health. People’s health and nutritional needs were met.

People who used the service were cared for by staff in a kind and respectful way. Staff supported people to maintain their interests and links with the local community.

People and their relatives were able to raise any suggestions or concerns that they might have with the manager and feel listened too.

There were enough staff available to work the service’s number of commissioned and contracted work hours. Staff understood their responsibility to report suspicions of harm and poor care practice. There were pre-employment checks in place to ensure that new staff were deemed suitable to work with the people they were supporting.

Staff were trained to provide effective care which met people’s individual support and care needs. Staff were supported by the manager to maintain and develop their skills through training. The standard of staff members’ work performance was reviewed by the management through observations and supervisions. This was to make sure that staff were competent and confident to deliver the care required.

The manager sought feedback about the quality of the service provided from people and/or their relatives. Staff were supported to raise any concerns or suggestions that they may have with the manager and felt listened to. There was a basic on-going quality monitoring process in place to identify areas of improvement required within the service. Where improvements had been identified, actions taken to reduce the risk of recurrence were recorded.

The CQC were not always informed of incidents that the provider was legally obliged to notify them of.