Updated 15 November 2017
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 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 was a comprehensive inspection which took place on 07 September 2017 and was announced. We gave the provider 48 hours’ notice of our visit to ensure that the registered managers of the service would be available.
The inspection was carried out by four adult social care inspectors and two experts by experience who had experience with supporting people with a learning disability who spoke to people and their relatives by telephone. An expert-by-experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service. On the day, two inspectors visited the office to look at care records and documentation relating to the care and governance of the people they supported. One inspector visited four supported living houses to look at the support provided by staff and to speak to people and the staff at the homes. One inspector spoke to staff by telephone to ask their view about the service and the support they gave to people. Before the inspection we reviewed the information we held about the provider, including information they had supplied in the Provider Information Return (PIR). A PIR 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.
Before our inspection we reviewed all the information we held about the service. This included any statutory notifications that had been sent to us. We contacted the local authority and Healthwatch. Healthwatch is an independent consumer champion that gathers and represents the views of the public about health and social care services in England.
During our visit we spoke with 10 people who used the service, 10 members of support staff including both the registered managers and four managers in the homes. We spent some time observing support given to people in their home. We also spent some time looking at documents and records that related to people’s care and the management of the service. We looked at six people’s care plans.