Archived: Enablement Service

Updated 15 March 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.

This inspection took place on the 28 September and 1 October 2018. The provider was given 48 hours' notice because the registered manager can be out of the office supporting staff or providing care. We needed to be sure that they would be available.

Before the inspection, we checked for any notifications made to us by the provider and the information we held on our database about the service and provider. Statutory notifications are pieces of information about important events which took place at the service, such as safeguarding incidents, which the provider is required to send to us by law. We reviewed the Provider Information Record (PIR). The PIR provides key information about the service, what the service does well and the improvements the provider plans to make.

The inspection was carried out by two adult social care inspectors and two experts by experience, which is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service. Their involvement was phoning people using the service and their relatives to ask them their views of the service.

During the inspection we spoke with five care staff, a care coordinator, the deputy manager and the registered manager.

We reviewed the care records for eight people using the service to see if they were up-to-date and reflective of the care which people received. We also looked at staff recruitment information that was held in the provider’s head office. We reviewed further records relating to the management of the service, including complaint records, spot checks, the training matrix and records of audits.

After the inspection, we spoke with 17 people who used the service and nine relatives.

Updated 15 March 2019

Enablement Service provides personal care to people in their own home. The service offered support to people that had left hospital or were recovering from a recent illness or injury. The service provides short term, intensive support to help people with everyday tasks that includes personal care. At the time of our inspection, there were 111 people who received personal care from the service. Due to the nature of the support the number of people receiving a service varied from week to week.

This was the first inspection of the service which was registered in March 2017.

The service had 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 helped people to stay safe. Staff knew about abuse and how to report it and other incidents or accidents which took place. Risks to people were assessed and updated and there were systems in place to ensure there was enough staff to meet people's needs.

People they currently supported needed minimal help with their medicines, the registered manager had ensured that appropriate systems were in place if the service was to administer medicines on people's behalf.

Staff told us that they received the support and development opportunities they needed to be able to meet people's needs. However we found that staff had not been recently trained in key areas of mandatory training.

People’s needs were assessed and care plans were developed to identify what care and support people required. People said they were involved in their care planning and were happy to express their views or raise concerns. When people’s needs changed, this was quickly identified and prompt appropriate action was taken to ensure people’s well-being was protected.

People experienced positive outcomes because of the service they received and gave us good feedback about their care and support.

People were supported to have choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible. People’s views on the service were regularly sought and acted on.

Staff were motivated and proud to work for the service; as a result, staff turnover was kept to a minimum ensuring that continuity of care was in place for most people who used the service.

Staff were respectful of people’s privacy and maintained their dignity.

The service followed safe recruitment practices and carried out appropriate checks before staff started supporting people.

The registered manager demonstrated leadership and a good understanding of the importance of effective quality assurance systems. There were processes in place to monitor quality and understand the experiences of people who used the service. We saw that regular visits and phone calls had been made to people using the service and their relatives to obtain feedback about the staff and the care provided.

The service worked in co-operation with other organisations such as healthcare services to deliver effective care and support.

The service listened and responded to people’s concerns and complaints, and used this to improve the quality of care. The service learnt lessons and made improvements when things went wrong.

We made three recommendations with regard to staff training on medicines management, manual handling and equality and diversity.