United Response - Newcastle DCA

Updated 5 January 2023

The inspection

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Inspection team

The inspection was completed by 1 inspector and an Expert by Experience. An Expert by Experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

Service and service type

This service provides care and support to people living in 10 ‘supported living’ settings, so that they can live as independently as possible. People’s care and housing are provided under separate contractual agreements. CQC does not regulate premises used for supported living; this inspection looked at people’s personal care and support.

This provider is required to have a registered manager to oversee the delivery of regulated activities at this location. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Registered managers and providers are legally responsible for how the service is run, for the quality and safety of the care provided and compliance with regulations.

At the time of our inspection there was no registered manager in post, but a recent application had been made to address this and was currently being processed.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was announced. We gave a short period of notice for this inspection because some people needed to be prepared for our visit. We also wanted to gain consent from relatives to call them prior to our visit to gain feedback.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We used feedback from the local authority safeguarding and commissioning teams. We contacted Healthwatch. Healthwatch is an independent consumer champion that gathers and represents the views of the public about health and social care services in England.

We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return (PIR). This is information providers are required to send us annually with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. We used all this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We visited 5 out of the 10 supported living homes which make up the service.

We met and observed 8 people and spoke with 7 either at their home or via telephone. We spoke with 7 relatives about their experiences of the care and support provided to their family member.

We contacted the whole staff team via email for feedback and spoke to staff at the 5 supported living homes we visited. We received feedback from 17 staff. This included, the regional manager, area manager, a relief area manager, service managers, team managers, support staff and agency staff.

We contacted 3 social workers, 2 local authority care managers, an advocate and a GP practice to gain feedback. We received 5 responses.

We reviewed a range of records. This included 5 people's care records and multiple medicine records and monitoring charts. We looked at 4 staff files in relation to recruitment, training and support. A variety of records relating to the management of the service, including policies and procedures, were reviewed.

After the inspection we continued to seek clarification to validate evidence found.

Updated 5 January 2023

About the service

United Response – Newcastle DCA is a supported living service. At the time of the inspection they were providing care and support to 25 people spread over 10 supported living premises. The service provides support to people with learning or physical disabilities or autistic spectrum disorder.

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.

The service was able to demonstrate how they were meeting the underpinning principles of Right support, right care, right culture. However, some improvements were required.

Right support:

People were supported by staff who focused on people's strengths and promoted what they could do. People could make choices and plan activities they preferred.

Medicines were managed safely. However, some improvements were needed in the records for medicines including handwritten records and when required medicines.

People were encouraged to be part of the community. Staff had a good understanding of people’s individual needs and encouraged them to reach their goals.

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.

There was enough staff to support people in a person-centred way. Some agency staff had been used at times. However, the provider had a robust safe recruitment drive in place to fill vacant posts.

Right care:

Staff understood how to protect people from abuse and what they needed to do to report this. Staff followed safe infection prevention practice in people's homes.

Right culture:

People were supported by staff who understood best practice in relation to the wide range of strengths and needs people with a learning disability and/or autistic people may have. This meant people received compassionate and empowering support that was tailored to their needs.

The provider needed to improve record keeping across a number of areas and was going to review quality assurance systems to support this going forward.

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 (published 15 January 2019).

Why we inspected

This inspection was prompted by a review of the information we held about this service. The inspection was also prompted in part due to concerns received about medicines, staffing and training and the care people received. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks.

We undertook a focused inspection. This report only covers our findings in relation to the Key Questions Safe, Effective and Well-Led.

For the key questions of Caring and Responsive which were not inspected, we used the rating awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating. The overall rating for the service has remained good. This is based on the findings at this inspection. We have made three recommendations in connection with medicines, infection prevention and control and training records.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for United Response - Newcastle DCA on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Follow up

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