17 July 2014
During a routine 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 was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.
OAM Group of Companies Limited provides personal care to people living in their home. At the time of our inspection there were 10 people using the service.
The service had a registered manager in post. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service and has the legal responsibility for meeting the requirements of the law; as does the provider.
The service had many aspects of safe care and people using the service told us how safe they felt with staff. People gave examples of how staff were their ‘eyes’ in their home as they relied on them to guide them to safety. Staff had received safeguarding training and knew the correct procedure to follow should they have concerns about abuse. However the service had not reported safeguarding matters to us where they should have done. This was a breach of Regulation 18 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010. You can see what action we told the provider to take at the back of the full version of the report.
Staff did not always receive effective support from the service, as supervisions and appraisals were not being carried out in line with the service policy consistently. We have told the provider to make improvements in this area.
People at the service were given effective support when the care package started and throughout as they were always asked what they wanted from their care. Staff knew people’s likes and dislikes and health needs well, as they told us about them. We also saw through the process of call monitoring that people were asked if the care they received still met their needs or needed to be changed in any way.
The service had a caring nature and this was seen from the positive feedback they received during call monitoring. People using the service also told us how helpful staff were and that they never felt that staff had to ‘rush off’ to their next call.
The quality checking procedures needed improvement as did the visibility of the registered manager. People told us they never had an issue in contacting a manager at the service and that their concerns were acknowledged promptly. However some staff we spoke to did not know who the registered manager was or had never seen them. The service conducted call monitoring and spot checks but they did not carry out good quality assurance. The service was not following their own policy to ensure people completed a survey, management meetings did not take place and supervision was not happening within the defined timescales. This was a breach of Regulation 10 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010. You can see what action we told the provider to take at the back of the full version of the report.