We carried out a review of the data available to us about Care at Home (Wearside) Limited on 6 July 2023. We have not found evidence that we need to carry out an inspection or reassess our rating at this stage.
This could change at any time if we receive new information. We will continue to monitor data about this service.
If you have concerns about Care at Home (Wearside) Limited, you can give feedback on this service.
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.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
People said they felt safe with the service provided. Staff knew about safeguarding procedures. Safe recruitment processes were in place. Staff worked well with other agencies to ensure people received care and support.
All people and relatives were complimentary about the direct care provided by support staff. They trusted the carer workers who supported them. They said staff were kind, caring and supportive of people and their families.
People and staff said communication could be improved. Not all people said they had regular care workers and they were not informed if they were going to be late. There were opportunities for people, relatives and staff to give their views about the service.
People received person-centred care from their regular carers. However, records did not all provide guidance to ensure people received consistent, person-centred care and support from all staff members.
We have made a recommendation about systems becoming more robust to ensure communication is more effective and that people receive person-centred care from all staff.
A quality assurance system was in place to assess the standards of care in the service. However, it needed to be strengthened. Audits that were carried out had not identified issues that we found at inspection.
We were assured that the provider was monitoring the use of PPE for effectiveness and people’s safely.
Systems were in place to manage medicines safely where support was required.
People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives, staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.
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 20 September 2019).
Why we inspected
We received concerns in relation to staffing levels, infection control during the pandemic and communication. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe and well-led only.
We reviewed the information we held about the service. No areas of concern were identified in the other key questions. We therefore did not inspect them. Ratings from previous comprehensive inspections for those key questions were used in calculating the overall rating at this inspection.
We have found evidence that the provider needs to make improvements. Please see the safe and well-led sections of this full report.
We received assurances improvements were being made as there was ongoing staff recruitment, an electronic system was in place to monitor calls and care provision and people were being surveyed to gather feedback about their call preferences.
You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Care at Home Wearside on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.
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.
Care at Home (Wearside) Limited is a domiciliary care agency. It was providing personal care to 97 people at the time of the inspection.
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.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
People received a good service and felt safe. Risks were well managed. The provider learned from previous accidents and incidents to reduce future risks. The registered manager understood their responsibilities about safeguarding and staff had been appropriately trained. Arrangements were in place for the safe administration of medicines.
There were enough staff on duty to meet the needs of people. The provider had an effective recruitment and selection procedure, and carried out relevant vetting checks when they employed staff. Staff were suitably trained and received regular supervisions and appraisals.
People’s needs were assessed before they started using the service. Staff treated people with dignity and respect. They helped to maintain people’s independence by encouraging them to care for themselves where possible.
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 supported this practice.
The provider had a complaints procedure and people were aware of how to make a complaint. An effective quality assurance process was in place. People and staff were regularly consulted about the quality of the service.
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 1 March 2017).
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.
Care at Home (Wearside) Limited is a domiciliary care service that provides personal care to people in their own homes. This includes care and support for people living with dementia. At the time of the inspection the service provided personal care services to 125 people.
The service had a registered manager in post at the time of inspection. 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.
People and their relatives told us they felt the service was safe. People had appropriate risk assessments in place and associated care plans.
The registered manager and staff were confident in their roles to safeguard people from abuse. Records showed staff members had alerted senior staff to situations where they felt people may have been at risk of or were being subjected to abuse. Safeguarding concerns were raised with the local authority in a timely way. Subsequent actions were taken from safeguarding concerns raised.
The registered manager understood the principles of Mental Capacity Act 2005 and had made referrals to the local authority requesting assessments and best interest decisions for people she felt were potentially vulnerable and lacked capacity to make specific decisions. The majority of staff had received up to date training in MCA and a plan was in place for the remaining staff. Members of staff we spoke with understood the importance of seeking consent from people prior to providing support.
Staff received regular supervisions and annual appraisals. Staff had up to date training with an ongoing plan to ensure training remained up to date.
People were supported to meet their nutritional needs. We saw people had eating and drinking risk assessments in place and people told us staff supported them by making meals and drinks. People had also been referred to the speech and language therapy team (SALT) for an assessment when required.
People told us staff were caring, lovely people. They were supported to be independent wherever possible and were supported to access the local community when receiving companionship as part of their personal care.
People had access to advocates where required. During the inspection we found one person was receiving advocacy support. The registered manager informed us that if a person lived alone and had no relatives, they would support them to access a suitable advocate through the local authority.
People’s care plans did not always contain sufficient information to guide staff in how to provide support to people safely. The majority of care plans were not personalised and did not contain people's personal preferences. The registered manager explained that a transition process was underway for all care plans to be transferred to a new, comprehensive template. We viewed some care plans that had completed this transition and found them to contain detailed guidance for staff including people’s personal preferences.
People and their relatives knew how to complain and felt confident and able to do so. People spoke positively about the service and told us they had nothing to complain about. One person did tell us about a previous complaint they had which the registered manager resolved and they were happy with the outcome. We saw from records that complaints received were investigated and acted upon with outcomes fed back to complainants.
Care and senior staff meetings were held regularly to discuss service provision and ideas to improve quality. Newsletters were also sent to all staff members regularly to keep them informed of changes.
The registered manager had quality audits in place to monitor service provision and identify any potential improvements to develop the service further.