About the service Plus Care Services is a domiciliary care agency. It provides support to older people and younger people with learning disabilities who live in their own homes. At the time of the inspection it was providing personal care to two people.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
People benefitted from support from care workers who spoke their language and understood their cultural and religious needs. A family member spoke of the service being responsive to their changing needs and being able to access support whenever they needed it and told us “I give them five stars.”
People were safeguarded from abuse as staff understood their responsibilities to report abuse and were confident that this would be taken seriously. Risks to people’s wellbeing were assessed with clear plans to mitigate these risks and ensure that people were supported with transfers and hoisting safely.
There were enough staff to meet people’s needs and recruitment procedures were followed to make sure staff were suitable for their roles. The service did not support anybody with their medicines but had suitable procedures in place to do so in future. Care workers had access to personal protective equipment, training and regular testing to protect people from the risk of COVID-19.
People’s care needs were assessed in a way which took account of their cultural needs and preferences. Care workers received appropriate training and supervision to meet people’s needs safely. People’s health and dietary needs were assessed with care plans in place to meet these.
People were supported to understand documents when English was not their first language or when they were unable to read but documents were not routinely offered in alternate formats to help people understand these.
People were treated with dignity and respect and had their choices and views respected. Managers carried out regular checks to ensure that people received good quality, responsive care. The registered manager promoted an open culture in the service with regular engagement with people and care workers. People using the service and care workers told us they could always reach a manager if they required advice or support.
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.
For more information, please read the detailed findings section of this report. If you are reading this as a separate summary, the full report can be found on the Care Quality Commission (CQC) website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at last inspection:
We registered this service on 4 December 2019 and this was the first inspection.
Why we inspected
This inspection was prompted by a review of the information we held about this service.
Recommendations
We have made two recommendations about how the service assesses people’s mental capacity regarding specific decisions and how it offers documents in alternative formats to people. We will check if the provider has acted on any recommendation at our next inspection.
Follow up
We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.
This was an ‘inspection using remote technology’. This means we did not visit the office location and instead used technology such as electronic file sharing to gather information, and video and phone calls to engage with people using the service as part of this performance review and assessment.