Updated 17 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:
• One inspector carried out this inspection.
Service and service type:
• The service is a home care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own homes.
• Not everyone using the service received regulated activity. CQC only inspects the service being received by people provided with personal care, that is help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also take into account any wider social care provided.
• The service had a manager registered with CQC. 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 three days’ notice of the inspection site visit. We needed to be sure the registered manager or other senior staff member would be available, and we needed to give the registered manager time to obtain people’s consent for us to contact them.
• Inspection activity started on 20 March 2019 and ended on 21 March 2019. We visited the office on 20 March 2019 to see the registered manager and staff, and to review records. On 21 March 2019 we spoke with people who used the service and their family members by telephone.
What we did:
Before the inspection we looked at information we held about the service:
• We require providers to send us key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. We call this the Provider Information Return. This information helps support our inspections.
• The law requires providers to notify us of certain events that happen during the running of a service. We reviewed notifications received since the last inspection.
• We reviewed the previous inspection report.
During the inspection:
• We spoke with four people who used the service and one family member. We also received an email from another person’s family member.
• We spoke with the registered manager and two staff members.
• We looked at the care records of four people.
• We looked at other records to do with the running of the service.