Background to this inspection
Updated
22 October 2019
The inspection
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection checked whether the registered provider was 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.
Inspection team
The inspection was completed by one inspector.
Service and service type:
Brooklands Homecare Ltd - Edenbridge is a domiciliary care service providing personal care to people living in their own homes.
The service was not required to have a registered manager. This was because the registered provider was in day to day charge of the running of the service.
Notice of inspection
We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection. This was because it is a small service and we needed to be sure that the registered provider would be in the office to support the inspection.
What we did before the inspection
We spoke by telephone with eight people who used the service and with three relatives. We also spoke by telephone with seven care staff.
We used information the registered provider sent us in their Provider Information Return. This is information we require registered providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make.
We reviewed other information we held about the service. This included notifications of incidents that the registered provider had sent us since our last inspection. These are events that happened in the service that registered providers are required to tell us about.
We invited feedback from the commissioning bodies who purchased some of the care provided by the service. We did this so that they could tell us their views about how well the service was meeting people's needs and wishes. This information helps support our inspections.
During the inspection
We spoke with the registered provider and the assistant manager at the service’s administrative office. We reviewed documents and records that described how care had been provided for five people. We also examined documents and records relating to how the service was run including health and safety, the management of medicines, learning lessons when things had gone wrong, obtaining consent and staff training.
After the inspection
We continued to seek clarification from the registered provider to validate evidence we found. We looked at records of the registered provider’s investigation and response to an ongoing safeguarding of adults concern.
Updated
22 October 2019
About the service
Brooklands Homecare Ltd - Edenbridge is a domiciliary care service that provides personal care for older people, younger adults, people who live with dementia and people who need support to maintain their mental health. It can also provide personal care for people with physical and/or sensory adaptive needs. At the time of this inspection the service was providing care for 60 people.
The personal care is provided by care staff completing care calls to people in their own homes. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) only inspects the service being received by people provided with personal care, where they do we also take into account any wider social care provided.
People's experience of using the service and what we found
People were positive about the service. A person said, “I think the service is very good in that it’s reliable and the staff are very kind and attentive. I can count on them.”
Shortly before the inspection the local safeguarding of adults authority had found a person had not been suitably supported to take medicines in a safe way. The person had also not been properly assisted to keep their home clean. The registered provider accepted the person had not been consistently assisted to manage their medicines in a safe way. They also said that a more robust approach should have been adopted to supporting the person to keep their home clean. These shortfalls had occurred because systems and processes used to operate, monitor and evaluate the running of the service were not consistently robust. We have made a recommendation about management systems.
Our other findings are as follows: People had received safe care and treatment and there were enough care staff to reliably complete care calls on time. Safe recruitment practices were in place.
Care was delivered in line with national guidance by care staff who had the knowledge and skills they needed. People were supported to eat and drink enough to have a balanced diet. People had been helped to obtain medical attention
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.
Care staff were courteous, respectful and promoted people’s independence. Confidential information was kept private.
People were consulted about the care they received and had information given to them in an accessible way. Equality and diversity was promoted and people were assisted to pursue their hobbies and interests. There were suitable arrangements to manage complaints and to enable people to have a dignified death.
People had been consulted about the development of the service. Good team work was promoted and joint working was in place.
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 rating for this service at the last inspection was Requires Improvement (published 31 August 2018) and there was one breach of regulations. The registered provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve. At this inspection we found that improvements had been made and the provider was no longer in breach of regulations.
The service remains rated Requires Improvement. This service has been rated Requires Improvement for the last two consecutive inspections.
Why we inspected
This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.
Follow up
We will meet with the registered provider following this report being published to discuss how they will make changes to ensure they improve their rating to at least, Good. We will work with the local authority to monitor progress. We will return to visit as per our inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.