Bluebird Care (Leeds North)

Updated 28 February 2019

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.

We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection visit because it is small and the manager is often out of the office supporting staff or providing care. We needed to be sure that they would be in.

Inspection site visit activity took place on 13 and 14 December 2018. We visited the office location to see the manager and office staff; and to review care records and policies and procedures.

This inspection was conducted by an adult social care inspector and an expert by experience. An expert by experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone using this type of care service.

We reviewed information we held about the service prior to the inspection, for example from statutory notifications (notifications the provider is obliged to send us about specific events or changes to the service), information from the local authority commissioners and local healthwatch. Healthwatch is the independent national champion for people who use health and social care services, and information from the PIR. 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.

During the inspection we reviewed a range of records relevant to people’s care and the operation of the service. This included four staff personnel files, six people’s care records, compliments and complaints, incident reports, meeting minutes and quality audit documents.

During the inspection we spoke with five people who used the service and two relatives of people using the service to gather feedback from their experiences. We also spoke with five staff, including the registered manager and care staff.

Updated 28 February 2019

This inspection took place on 13 and 14 December 2018 and was announced. This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats in the community. It provides a service to older adults and younger disabled adults.

Not everyone using Bluebird Care (Leeds North) receives regulated activity; The Care Quality Commission (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.

There was a registered manager in post at the time of the inspection. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the CQC 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.

Everyone we spoke with told us the service was safe. Medicines were managed and monitored safely, and staff had received training in safeguarding vulnerable adults. Staff were able to describe how they would identify and report signs of abuse.

Risks to people’s safety were managed, however risk assessment processes did not always contain person-centred information.

People told us staff were well trained and competent to meet their needs. New staff received a comprehensive induction, and staff received appropriate support and encouragement from senior staff.

People’s health and wellbeing was monitored and recorded effectively. Any changes to peoples’ health and wellbeing was recorded and any actions taken by health and social care professionals cascaded to staff where relevant.

Staff were kind, caring and compassionate. staff understood how to protect and promote people’s dignity and privacy, as well as support them to live independent lives.

Care plans contained good, person-centred information with lots of detail for staff on how people wanted their needs met. Care plans were reviewed regularly, and people or their relatives had access to their own care records through an app (an application downloaded by a user to a mobile device) where they could communicate any changing need and ensure this was acted upon immediately.

The service had policies and procedures in place for managing complaints. There were no formal complaints in 2018, however the service made the effort to record and thoroughly investigate verbal ‘minor’ complaints to ensure people’s concerns were resolved before they escalated into formal complaints or dissatisfaction.

There was a positive open culture at the service. Staff we spoke with were confident in the leadership of the service. The service gathered feedback from staff and people who used the service in order to monitor and improve the quality of the service.

There was a comprehensive system of quality assurance in place to monitor, analyse and improve the quality of the service delivered. There were regular audits and meetings held to discuss their outcomes.