Updated 31 January 2018
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.
This comprehensive inspection took place on 10 January 2018 and was announced. The provider was given four days’ notice because the location provides a supported living service and we needed to be sure that someone would be available at the office. We also needed to arrange to speak on the telephone to people as part of this inspection and to visit other people in their homes. The inspection visit was carried out by one inspector and an 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. The expert-by-experience did not attend the office base of the service or visit people at home, but spoke by telephone with people and relatives of people who used the service.
This service provides care and support to people with a learning disability living either in a supported living setting or within their own homes. At the time of the inspection 21 people were in receipt of personal care support. People’s care and housing are provided under separate contractual agreements. CQC does not regulate premises used for supported living; this inspection looked at people’s personal care and support.
Mencap South Notts Services met the values that underpin the Registering the Right Support and other best practice guidance. These values include choice, promotion of independence and inclusion. People with learning disabilities and autism using the service can live as ordinary a life as any citizen.
On this occasion we did not ask the provider to send us provider information return (PIR) prior to the inspection. This is a form that asks the provider to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. However we offered the registered manager the opportunity to share information they felt relevant with us. We also reviewed information we held about the service. This included statutory notifications the registered manager had sent us. A statutory notification is information about important events which the provider is required to send to us by law. We used this to formulate our inspection plan.
During the inspection we spoke with five people who used the service and the relatives of four people. We spoke with the registered manager, three service managers, an assistant service manager and four care staff. We also observed how staff interacted with people when we visited them in their homes. We looked at two people’s care records to check that the care they received matched the information in their records. We looked at the training records to see how staff were trained and supported to deliver care appropriate to meet each person’s needs and checked to see how staff were recruited. We looked at the systems the provider had in place to ensure the quality of the service was continuously monitored and reviewed to drive improvement.