Bluebird Care (Greenwich)

Updated 27 July 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. 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 Care Act 2014.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out 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

Bluebird Care (Greenwich) is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care and support to adults and older people with varying needs living within their own homes. 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 site visit took place on 28 June 2019 and was announced. We gave the provider 48 hours' notice because the location provides a domiciliary care service and we needed to ensure that someone was present at the office.

What we did

Before the inspection we reviewed the information, we held about the service. This included details about incidents the provider must tell us about, such as any safeguarding alerts they had raised. We also sought feedback from local authorities and or professionals who work with the service. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return. This is information providers are required to send us with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. This information helps support our inspections. We used all of this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection visit we met and spoke with the director, registered manager, two care supervisors and one care worker. The expert-by-experience spoke with two people using the service and five relatives by telephone to seek their feedback about the service. We reviewed a range of records including six people’s care plans and records and three staff recruitment and training records. We also reviewed records used in managing the service for example, policies and procedures, monitoring records and minutes of meetings.

Updated 27 July 2019

About the service

Bluebird Care (Greenwich) is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care, support and live in care services to adults and older people living within their own homes. Not everyone using the service may receive the regulated activity; personal care. 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 there were approximately 80 people using the service.

People’s experience of using this service

People and their relatives spoke positively about the care and support they received. Staff communicated well with people and had built good relationships with them. Professionals feedback was also positive confirming good partnership working.

People and their relatives told us they felt safe. Safeguarding and whistleblowing policies and procedures were in place and staff were aware of how to keep people safe. People were protected from identified risks and plans were in place to manage risks safely in the least restrictive way.

Arrangements were in place to manage medicines safely and staff followed appropriate infection control practices to prevent the spread of infections. Appropriate recruitment checks took place before staff started work and there were sufficient staff available to meet people's needs. Staff had the skills, knowledge and experience to support people appropriately. Staff were supported through induction, training and supervision.

People were supported to maintain a healthy balanced diet where this was part of the planned care. 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 support this practice.

People and their relatives were involved and consulted about their care and support needs. People had access to health and social care professionals as required and were supported to access community services.

Staff worked with people to promote their rights and understood the Equality Act 2010; supporting people appropriately addressing any protected characteristics. There were systems in place to assess, monitor and improve the quality of the service. The service worked well in partnership with health and social care professionals.

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 Good (published 30 November 2016).

Why we inspected

This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service until we return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.