Infinity Care Limited

On this page

• Overview
• Shared direction and culture
• Capable, compassionate and inclusive leaders
• Freedom to speak up
• Workforce equality, diversity and inclusion
• Governance, management and sustainability
• Partnerships and communities
• Learning, improvement and innovation

Well-led – this means we looked for evidence that service leadership, management and governance assured high-quality, person-centred care; supported learning and innovation; and promoted an open, fair culture.

At our last assessment we rated this key question inadequate. At this assessment the rating has improved to requires improvement. This meant the management and leadership was inconsistent. Leaders and the culture they created did not always support the delivery of high-quality, person-centred care.

The service had a continuing breach of the legal Regulation in relation to good governance. However, other improvements had been made and the service was no longer in breach of the Regulation relating to the failure to notify CQC of notifiable incidents.

This service scored 62 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

The service had a shared vision, strategy, and culture. The induction of new staff involved providing information about the service, its, vision, and values.

The registered managers were very committed to providing responsive person-centred care. Staff we spoke with shared that commitment. For example, staff understood and practiced in a way which was in keeping with the organisations values which included treating people as individuals and going the ‘extra mile’ when meeting people’s needs.

A staff member told us, “We always know that the care comes first… we go above and beyond for our clients”. They provided an example where staff had provided care to a person’s informal carer, when they became ill, even though they weren’t paid for this, whilst a longer term arrangement was put in place. In another example, a staff member told us the management team had ensured staff were made available to stay with 1 person who had fallen until 2am when the ambulance arrived. The staff member told us, “We worked as a team to ensure there was always someone there and we all had a break as needed”.

The service had inclusive leaders at all levels who understood the context in which they delivered care, treatment and support and embodied the culture and values of their workforce and organisation. Leaders had the skills, knowledge, experience, and credibility to lead effectively. They did so with integrity, openness, and honesty.

The leadership team demonstrated a good knowledge of people and how they liked to be supported. Staff were very positive about the registered managers and the way the service was organised and run. One staff member said, “I have confidence in them, I can get advice on anything, whenever I need it, nothing is too much trouble.” Staff reported there was a positive culture and morale was good. They all felt valued.

There was a clear leadership structure in place and there was an understanding this would need to be kept under review to ensure effective leadership was sustained as the service grew. Arrangements were being made to ensure the leadership team were provided with supervision and ongoing professional development.

The service fostered a positive culture where staff felt they could speak up and their voice would be heard.

There was a ‘Raising concerns and speaking up’ policy in place. Surveys had been undertaken with staff to seek their feedback about the service. Most of the feedback was positive. Where there was more neutral feedback, more could have been done to follow this up with the staff team. Staff meetings demonstrated that staff were asked to share any ideas or concerns they might have. One staff member told us, “Staff meetings are held regularly… They always share the minutes, so we all know what has taken place and staff have an opportunity raise anything and share ideas.”

Staff were confident the leadership team were efficient at dealing with concerns or incidents. One staff member said, “Any issues are listened to and resolved”.

A suitable duty of candour policy was in place and the leadership team understood the requirement to be open and transparent, and to offer an apology, in the event of certain safety related incidents occurring.

The service valued diversity in their workforce. They work towards an inclusive and fair culture by improving equality and equity for people who work for them.

Staff were recruited on the basis of experience, knowledge, and suitability to provide care and support. Changes had been made to the recruitment process to ensure applicants were not discriminated against. Staff were treated equally and fairly, were supported to have time off when needed for religious or caring responsibilities and reasonable adjustments had been made to support them to perform their roles.

Training had been adapted to include a stronger visual element to enable this to be accessible to a staff member who did not have English as their first language.

The service did not always have clear systems of good governance.

Although we noted that a number of improvements had been made, further improvements were needed to deliver care which fully met the requirements of the Regulation regarding good governance.

New governance systems had been put in place, which was positive, but these needed to be refined and developed to ensure they were fully effective. The existing auditing arrangements had identified some, but not all of the concerns we found which included shortfalls in how some risks were being managed and in the completeness of records relating to people’s care and treatment needs. The provider had arranged for a mock inspection to take place in September 2024. Whilst many of the recommendations from this had been acted on, we continued to find similar concerns with regards to the completion of PRN medicines records. A mental capacity assessment for the use of covert medicines had not been completed in line with best practice. The leadership team could not evidence what action had been taken to seek assurances about 1 staff member’s conduct in previous roles in health and social care. Audits of incidents and accidents lacked a focus on learning lessons and driving improvements.

Notifications to CQC were now being made appropriately, but the leadership team lacked some understanding of what events should be reported to the local authority under local protocols.

The service understood their duty to collaborate and work in partnership, so services work seamlessly for people. They shared information and learning with partners and collaborate for improvement.

Feedback from professionals was positive about their experience of working with Infinity Care. One professional told us, “They are consistent with their arrival times, and their faces don’t change, that reassuring. I have never heard any complaints [From people].”

People were assisted to access their local community by staff to avoid isolation.

The service was developing tools to assist in achieving a focus on continuous learning, innovation, and improvement across the organisation.

Staff and people were encouraged to contribute their ideas and suggestions for how the service might improve. Staff told us they were encouraged to undertake wider training or develop further in their roles. For example, 1 staff member told us they had expressed an interest in training in end of life care. They told us the leadership had arranged for this to take place.

The registered manager attended a local forum aimed at sharing best practice. The provider had taken action to implement a new suite of policies and procedures and a new digital social care record. There were plans to develop how this system was being used to support effective quality monitoring of the service.

Since our last inspection, a number of new improvements had been implemented within the service and the service had worked in partnership with other agencies to support ongoing improvements. However, as noted throughout this report, some of the improved systems and processes needed to be further refined and embedded to ensure they provided the registered managers with robust tools to focus on learning opportunities and how best to develop and improve the service. A service improvement plan was in place. This demonstrated that the service had made a number of improvements since the last inspection, but we have identified more still needed to be done. The leadership have begun identifying the specific actions they plan to take to improve the quality and safety of their service and addressing any identified issues raised during the inspection.