Caremark Newcastle

Updated 10 August 2022

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 carried out by one inspector and one 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 is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats.

Registered Manager

This service is required to have a registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. 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.

At the time of our inspection there was a manager in post who was in the process of registering with the Care Quality Commission.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was unannounced.

Inspection activity started on 20 July 2022 and ended on 03 August 2022. We visited the location’s office on 03 August 2022.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service. 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 communicated with six people who used the service and 10 relatives about their experience of the care provided. Not everyone who used the service communicated verbally or wished to speak on the telephone, therefore they gave us permission to speak with their relative. We spoke with nine members of staff including the manager and eight support workers. We reviewed a range of records. This included four people's care records and multiple medicine records. We looked at five staff files in relation to recruitment. A variety of records relating to the management of the service, including policies and procedures, training data and quality assurance records were reviewed.

Updated 10 August 2022

About the service

Caremark Newcastle is a domiciliary care service that provides personal care to people living in their own homes. At the time of inspection 20 people were receiving the regulated activity personal care.

Not everyone who uses the service may receive 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.

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

People felt safe with the service provided. Improvements had been made to help ensure people's safety. Staff knew about safeguarding procedures.

Rota management was becoming better managed, to ensure people received timely and consistent care from the same staff.

Electronic care planning had been introduced and records provided improved guidance to ensure people received person-centred care.

Risks were assessed and mitigated to keep people safe. Improvements had been made to staff recruitment to ensure it was safe and effective. Improvements were being made and people were correctly supported with their medicines.

Staff were becoming better trained. They worked well with other agencies to ensure people received appropriate care and support. Staff were supported by the organisation and were aware of their responsibility to share any concerns about the care provided.

The provider was monitoring the use of PPE for effectiveness and people’s 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.

All people and relatives were complimentary about the direct care provided by support staff. A person told us, “Staff talk to me and have a laugh and giggle” and “The girls absolutely care without a shadow of a doubt.”

Improvements had been made to the quality assurance systems to ensure people received safe and person-centred care with their views being taken into account. Effective systems were being put into place to ensure people were central to the delivery of their care.

We have made a recommendation about ensuring a formal system of external scrutiny to strengthen the governance of the service.

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 3 March 2022).

Why we inspected

We received concerns in relation to staffing and governance. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe and well-led only.

For those key questions not inspected, we used the ratings awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating.

The overall rating for the service has remained good based on the findings of this inspection.

We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at risk of harm from these concerns as the new manager had identified areas of improvement before the inspection and had made immediate improvements. Please see the safe and well-led sections of this full report.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Caremark Newcastle 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.