Eminent Domiciliary Care Agency

Updated 28 April 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

This inspection was undertaken by one 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 homes.

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 a short period notice of the inspection 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 5 April and ended on 12 April 2023. We visited the location’s office on 6 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, 6 relatives and 7 staff, including care workers, a care coordinator and the registered manager. We reviewed 5 people’s care records and records relating to the management of the service and staffing.

Updated 28 April 2023

About the service

Eminent Domiciliary Care Agency provides people with support in their own homes. 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. At the time of our inspection 75 people were receiving support from the service, 40 of whom were receiving support with their personal care. The service supported adults with a range of needs including physical health, mental health, learning disabilities and/or autism, and dementia.

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.

Right Support: 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. Staff were aware of people’s needs and provided them with the level of support they required, taking account of any action required to minimise risks to their safety and welfare.

Right Care: Staff understood how to protect people from poor care and abuse. The service worked well with other agencies to do so. Staff had training on how to recognise and report abuse and they knew how to apply it. The service had enough appropriately skilled staff to meet people’s needs and keep them safe. Staff provided people with any support they required with medicines management in a safe way. Staff adhered to infection prevention and control best practice guidance.

Right Culture: The service enabled people and those important to them to worked with staff to develop the service. Staff valued and acted upon people’s views. There were systems in place to engage with people, staff and their relatives to gather their views and feedback about service delivery. People’s quality of life was enhanced by the service’s culture of improvement and inclusivity. There was a programme of spot checks and audits to ensure good quality care was provided that met people’s needs. Where improvements were identified, action was taken to address this.

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

Rating at last inspection

The last rating for this service was rated good (published 12 December 2017).

Why we inspected

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

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 remained good based on the findings of this inspection.

Follow up

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