About with Friends

About with Friends is a charitable organisation that offers support, activities, guidance, and care to younger adults with a learning disability and/or younger autistic people. At the time of our inspection there were 125 people using the service however only 5 were receiving support with personal care in their own homes. 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.

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

The service’s values focused on people being supported to achieve their potential through dedicated and individualised care that met their needs; this was demonstrated throughout this performance review and assessment. People were included in all decisions about their care, and we saw many examples of where the service’s support had helped people achieve better independence and wellbeing. 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.

Right Care

People told us the service people received was exceptionally person-centred and achieved positive outcomes that met their needs. The service was forward-thinking, proactive, and dedicated with a focus on assisting people to be fully engaged members of their local community. Staff were kind, caring, motivational and supportive. People’s dignity was maintained, and they were supported to be who they wanted to be. Feedback was sought from people and this was listened to and acted upon.

Right Culture

The management team were described as supportive, nurturing, and accessible. They and the trustees had a good oversight of the service and systems were in place to monitor the quality of it to aid improvement and sustainability. The registered manager responded positively to the few minor shortfalls identified as part of this performance review and assessment and understood their regulatory responsibilities. Staff told us they worked well together as a team and felt valued. People said they would recommend the service due to its person-centred approach and the skills, values, and abilities of its staff.

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

Rating at last inspection and update

The last rating for this service was good (report published on 03 September 2017).

Why we inspected

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

Recommendations

We have made a recommendation about the use of ‘as required’ (PRN) medicines.

Follow up

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

There was a registered manager in post. 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.

The service was safe. Individual risks to people’s health and wellbeing had been identified and steps to manage and mitigate known risks were taken. Risk assessments of people’s homes had been carried out and this helped to ensure that staff would be able to care for people in a safe environment.

Staff had received training in safeguarding adults and understood the procedures for reporting any concerns.

There were enough staff to safely ensure that people’s care and support needs were met and people’s visits were always covered. There were also safe recruitment practices in place. This meant that only staff who were suitable to care for people were employed by the service.

People were supported to receive their medicines in a safe way by staff who had undergone the appropriate training in this area.

There was a comprehensive training programme for staff and staff could access courses which would enable them to gain an in depth knowledge of conditions that the people they cared for were living with. Staff were further supported through regular supervisions and appraisals with the registered manager.

Staff had a good understanding of people’s individual capacity to make decisions and always sought people’s consent before delivering any care to people.

People were sometimes supported with meal preparation and maintaining a healthy nutritional intake. Staff would support people with accessing healthcare professionals where there were concerns about a person’s health.

Staff were caring and enjoyed working in the service. They had a good understanding of person centred care and made every effort to involve people in their care. Staff understood people’s care and support needs well. People felt they could approach staff and felt listened to.

People’s privacy and dignity was respected by staff who understood how people preferred to have their care delivered.

People’s care plans were reviewed and updated when necessary. The care plans were detailed and gave clear guidance about how people liked to be cared for. People’s care was individualised and people’s needs were accommodated wherever possible.

There was a complaints procedure in place and people felt able to raise a concern if needed and knew who they would report their concerns to.

The service was run with the people who used it. The provider, registered manager and the staff were clear that people using the service should be at the heart of everything. People were involved in the running of the service wherever possible.

There were systems in place to assess and monitor the quality of service being delivered and the provider and registered manager are continually making improvements about how they can best assess the quality of the service people receive.