AIM Homecare West

Updated 25 April 2019

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. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team:

Two inspectors carried out the inspection.

Service and service type:

This service provides care and support to people living in their own homes. At the time of our inspection 27 people were receiving personal care and support.

The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.

Notice of inspection:

We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection visit because the location provides a domiciliary care service and we needed to be sure that the staff and people we needed to talk to would be available.

What we did:

Before the inspection we reviewed any notifications we had received from the service. A notification is information about important events which the service is required to tell us about by law. We also reviewed any information about the service that we had received from external agencies. We assessed the 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. We used all this information to plan our inspection.

This inspection included speaking with three people, four relatives, eight staff members, deputy manager and the registered manager. We reviewed records related to the care of five people. We reviewed recruitment files for six staff. We looked at records relating to the management of the service including;

• Policies and procedures

• Audits and quality assurance reports

• Records of accidents, incidents, compliments and complaints

Updated 25 April 2019

About the service:

AIM Homecare 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. At the time of the inspection they were providing personal care to 27 people across Hampshire.

What life is like for people using this service:

People received a service that provided them with safe, effective and good quality care. People told us they were happy and felt safe being supported by AIM Homecare Limited. We saw evidence that people were encouraged to be independent. Staff understood people’s individual communication needs and worked in proactive ways to provide person-centred support.

The provider supported staff in providing effective care for people through person-centred care planning, training and supervision. The provider ensured the provision of best practice guidance to support staff in meeting people's needs.

The management of risk was effective and people were protected from harm. The management of medicines was safe which meant people were protected from the risk of harm.

People’s human rights were upheld and the principles of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 were

understood by staff.

People, their relatives and staff told us they thought the home was well led and spoke positively about the manager. The provider and manager carried out audits to ensure the service was effective. Staff supported people to integrate into their local community and the culture of the service promoted the values of supporting people to be as independent as possible.

Rating at last inspection:

The service was first registered with the Care Quality Commission on 26 January 2018. This was their first inspection since registration.

Why we inspected:

This was a planned comprehensive inspection.

Follow up:

We will continue to monitor the service and plan to inspect it in line with our re-inspection schedule. If we receive any information of concern we may bring our inspection forward.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.