Background to this inspection
Updated
21 October 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 was undertaken by one inspector on 6 and 7 September 2017. The provider was given notice of our inspection visit because the location provides a domiciliary care service and we needed to be sure staff would be available at the location office in Northampton. An ‘expert-by-experience’ was also involved in speaking with people who had agreed to be telephoned to ask them about their experience of using the service. An expert-by-experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.
Before our inspection, we reviewed information we held about the provider such as, for example, statutory notifications that they had sent us. A statutory notification is information about important events which the provider is required to send us by law. We also took into account other information the provider had sent us about their service.
During this inspection we visited the provider’s office located in Northampton. We looked at the care and support records of four people using the service and four records in relation to staff recruitment and training. We met and spoke with the manager about the day-to-day management of the service. We also met and spoke with three of the care staff team individually about their role and the training and support they received to enable them to do their job. We arranged to speak with four people on the telephone and with their prior agreement we also visited four people at home to ask them about their experience of using the service.
Updated
21 October 2017
This inspection took place on 6 and 7 September and was announced. ‘Specialist Home Care Service for Older People South’ provides a domiciliary support service to enable people to continue living at home. The service predominantly supports older people with dementia care needs in Northampton and surrounding area. The number of people that received a service varied but approximately 32 people were supported when we inspected.
The manager in post had applied to register with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to manage the service. 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.
People were supported in their own home by staff that were able to meet their needs safely. Their needs were assessed prior to taking up the service and their agreed care plans reflected people’s needs and preferences in relation to the care provided. Staff had the skills and knowledge they needed to provide people’s care. There were sufficient numbers of staff available in the team to work in the community and meet people’s needs in a timely way.
People benefitted from receiving personal care and support from trained staff that were caring, friendly, and responsive to their changing needs. They were treated with dignity and their right to make choices about how they preferred their care to be provided was respected. People’s rights were protected.
People received a service from a staff team that knew their job. There were risk assessments in place to reduce and manage the risks to people’s health and welfare. Staff understood their role in caring for people that lacked capacity to make specific decisions under the Mental Capacity Act 2005. Staff understood the need to protect people from harm and knew what action they should take if they had any concerns. Staff ensured that people that required support to manage their medicines received their medicines as prescribed.
People were protected from the risks associated with the recruitment of staff by robust recruitment systems and the provision of appropriate training to all new recruits.
People benefitted from a service that was appropriately managed so that they received their service in a timely and reliable way. Staff were supported by a manager that was receptive to ideas for improvement and the staff team were committed to providing consistently good standards of care.
People knew how to raise concerns and complaints and the provider had appropriate policies and procedures in place to manage such eventualities. There were also systems in place to assess and monitor the on-going quality of the service. People’s views about the quality of their service were sought and acted upon.