Five Star Homecare Leeds Ltd

Five Star Homecare is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to adults living in their own homes. 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. During our inspection visit, the service was caring for 38 people.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

People and their relatives were positive about staff and told us the service provided was safe and had a positive impact in their lives.

Overall, medication was managed safely. Most risks to people's care were assessed and actions put in place to manage them. Incidents were analysed and actions taken, when required. Recruitment was managed safely.

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.

People’s healthcare needs were understood and met. The provider kept in close contact with relevant healthcare professionals. Support with nutrition and hydration was provided effectively.

Care plans were detailed, and person centred. Staff knew people well and had the necessary skills, training and support to do their jobs appropriately.

There was a complaints and compliments procedure in place, and this was being followed. People and family members were confident that any concerns or complaints would be listened to and acted upon quickly by the registered manager.

There were several quality assurance measures in place and most had been effective, but we found some examples were this could be further improved. We received positive feedback about the management team being approachable and responsive.

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 requires improvement (published 15 December 2020).

The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve.

At this inspection we found improvements had been made and the provider was no longer in breach of regulations.

Why we inspected

This inspection was prompted by a review of the information we held about this service.

Follow up

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

Five Star Homecare is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to adults living in their own homes. 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. At the time of the inspection, the service was supporting 38 people.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

People and relatives shared positive feedback about the care provided. However, during this inspection, we were not assured the service provided was always safe and we found widespread shortfalls in the way the service was managed.

The provider failed to implement effective processes to assess and monitor the quality of the service and to identify the issues found during our inspection. Records were not complete or contemporaneous.

Management were not aware of or following the regulations, best practice guidance or their own policies and procedures.

We found several issues with the management of medication and risks to people’s care were not fully assessed, planned for or documented. We could not be sure the equipment used to support people was always safe. We referred these concerns to the local safeguarding team.

People were not supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff did not support them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service did not support this practice. We found some people who lacked capacity in relation to their care, had their liberty restricted as part of their care arrangements. We also referred these concerns to the local safeguarding team.

Care plans lacked detail in relation to specific areas of people's care and needs. People and relatives shared positive feedback about staff being caring and kind in their approach.

Overall, recruitment was managed safely and we found examples of good practice in Infection control and prevention.

The registered manager was receptive to the inspection process and told us they were willing to learn and improve. People, relatives and staff shared positive feedback about the management of the service. Staff told us Five Star homecare was a good place to work.

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

Rating at last inspection

This service was registered with us on 19 April 2020 and this is the first inspection.

Why we inspected

The inspection was prompted in part due to concerns received about how the provider was managing and reporting safeguarding concerns and their knowledge of the regulations. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks.

We have found evidence that the provider needs to make improvements. Please see the Safe, Effective, Responsive and Well Led sections of this full report.

Enforcement

We are mindful of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our regulatory function. This meant we took account of the exceptional circumstances arising as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic when considering what enforcement action was necessary and proportionate to keep people safe as a result of this inspection. We will continue to discharge our regulatory enforcement functions required to keep people safe and to hold providers to account where it is necessary for us to do so.

We found breaches in relation to safeguarding service users from abuse and improper treatment, safe care and treatment, need for consent and good governance at this inspection.

Full information about CQC’s regulatory response to the more serious concerns found during inspections is added to reports after any representations and appeals have been concluded.

Follow up

We will request an action plan for the provider to understand what they will do to improve the standards of quality and safety. We will work alongside the provider and local authority to monitor progress. We will return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.