Falcon Care Agency Ltd

Updated 26 October 2023

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 completed by 4 inspectors.

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 provider is required to have a registered manager to oversee the delivery of regulated activities at this location. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Registered managers and providers are legally responsible for how the service is run, for the quality and safety of the care provided and compliance with regulations.

At the time of our inspection there was a registered manager in post.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was unannounced.

What we did before 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. The provider was not asked to complete a Provider Information Return (PIR) prior to this inspection. A PIR is information providers send us to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We used all this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with 3 members of staff, including the registered manager.

We reviewed a range of records. This included 8 people's care plans and associated documents. We reviewed 18 staff files in relation to recruitment and supervision. A variety of records relating to the management of the service, including policies and procedures were reviewed.

Updated 26 October 2023

About the service

Falcon Care Agency Ltd is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care. The service provides support to youngers adults with dementia, physical disabilities and long-term mental health conditions. At the time of our inspection there were 28 people using the service. The registered manager advised inspectors that all these people received personal care.

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

Service users were not protected from abuse and improper treatment. One person was found to be restrained by staff without legal authority, or consent from the person. Risks to people using the service were not assessed or mitigated. Medicines were not managed safely. Staff were not recruited safely.

Staff did not have the training and skills to support the people they worked with. There was a lack of training delivered to staff. Staff did not receive regular competency assessments or supervision meetings with the registered manager. Care plans were not always in place for people.

Where people were deemed to lack capacity, formal assessments had not been carried out to assess whether they needed support with decision making. This meant staff had no guidance in place, and risked staff restricting people by making unnecessary decisions on their behalf.

The service was not caring. As a result of our inspection, 9 referrals were made to the Local Authority to safeguard people from harm and abuse. There were widespread concerns found during the inspection, and these did not demonstrate that caring and respectful care was provided at all times to people.

People's care was not personalised. People were not always supported with their communication needs which meant the provider could not be assured that people were always heard or understood by staff. The service did not always support people appropriately in the pursuit of their own activities, and hobbies.

The service was not well-led. There were widespread shortfalls in the day to day running of the service, leading to multiple breaches of regulation.

We expect health and social care providers to guarantee autistic people and people with a learning disability the choices, dignity, independence and good access to local communities that most people take for granted. Right support, right care, right culture is the statutory guidance which supports CQC to make assessments and judgements about services providing support to people with a learning disability and/or autistic people. We considered this guidance as there were people using the service who have a learning disability and or who are autistic.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection

The last rating for this service was good (published 8 December 2021).

Why we inspected

The inspection was prompted in part due to concerns received about safeguarding, training, medicines, and quality of care. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks.

The overall rating for the service has changed from good to inadequate based on the findings of this inspection.

You can see what action we have asked the provider to take at the end of this full report.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Falcon Care Agency Ltd on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Enforcement

We have identified breaches in relation to person centred care, consent, staffing, recruitment, safety, protecting people from abuse, and good governance at this inspection.

Please see the action we have told the provider to take at the end of this report.

Full information about CQC’s regulatory response to the more serious concerns found during inspections is added to reports after any representations and appeals have been concluded.

Follow up

The overall rating for this service is ‘Inadequate’ and the service is therefore in ‘special measures’. This means we will keep the service under review and, if we do not propose to cancel the provider’s registration, we will re-inspect within 6 months to check for significant improvements.

If the provider has not made enough improvement within this timeframe and there is still a rating of inadequate for any key question or overall rating, we will take action in line with our enforcement procedures. This will mean we will begin the process of preventing the provider from operating this service. This will usually lead to cancellation of their registration or to varying the conditions the registration.

For adult social care services, the maximum time for being in special measures will usually be no more than 12 months. If the service has demonstrated improvements when we inspect it, and it is no longer rated as inadequate for any of the five key questions it will no longer be in special measures.