Lancashire Childrens 0-19 Service

Updated 20 January 2023

The Lancashire 0-19 service is run by HCRG Care Services Ltd. The service provides advice, information and support to children and young people aged 0-19 and their families. The service covers Central, East and North Lancashire and operates out of three hubs based in Preston, Lancaster and Burnley. Each hub works with 20 spoke sites based across Lancashire.

The service is an integrated public health nursing service commissioned to deliver the Healthy Child Programme. The service offers 0–5-year-old health visiting, 5-19 years school nursing, transitional support for special educational needs and disabilities for those up to the age of 25. It also offers specialist infant feeding provision and specialist perinatal mental health support.

The service has a registered manager in place and is registered for the treatment of disease, disorder or injury.

This is the first time we have inspected this service.

Updated 20 January 2023

We rated it as ​good​ because:

Staff had training in key skills, understood how to protect children and young people from abuse, and managed safety well. Staff controlled infection risk well. Staff assessed risks to children and young people, acted on them and kept good care records. The service managed safety incidents well and learned lessons from them.

Managers monitored the effectiveness of the service and made sure staff were competent. Staff worked well together for the benefit of children and young people, advised them and their families on how to lead healthier lives, supported them to make decisions about their care, and had access to good information.

Staff treated children and young people with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity, took account of their individual needs, and helped them understand their conditions. They provided emotional support to children and young people, families and carers.

The service planned care to meet the needs of local people, took account of children and young people’s individual needs, and made it easy for people to give feedback.

Leaders ran services well using reliable information systems and supported staff to develop their skills. Staff understood the service’s vision and values, and how to apply them in their work. Staff felt respected, supported and valued. They were focused on the needs of children and young people receiving care. Staff were clear about their roles and accountabilities. The service engaged well with children, young people and the community to plan and manage services and all staff were committed to improving services continually.

However:

Although the service had enough staff to care for children and young people and keep them safe, caseloads were high.

Staff did not complete all statutory visits required in the health child programme within the allocated timescales. Under this programme staff are required to carry out mandatory visits at key points in a child’s life. For example, the compliance levels for the 2-2.5 year visit was at 55% and the new born visit compliance was 31% within 14 days, however, the service had agreed with the commissioners extend this target by an extra 7 days to achieve this contact and this enabled staff to see 97% of new births in the 21 days. The service had implemented a range of measure to mitigate the impact of not carrying out these visits in the required timescales and had plans in place to work towards carrying out the mandated visits within the required timescales.

Not everyone who used the service knew how to complain. However, everyone we spoke to told us they felt they could complain if they needed to and that it would be taken seriously.

Updated 20 January 2023

This was the first inspection of this service​. We rated it as ​good​.

See the summary above for details.