Archived: Heart of England Mencap - 1 Old Road

Heart of England Mencap – 1 old Road provides accommodation and personal care for up to four people with learning disabilities or autistic spectrum disorder. The provider leases the property from a housing association and is responsible for managing it. At the time of our visit the service supported three people. The service was last inspected on 10 July 2013 when we found they were meeting the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations.

The service is required to have a registered manager in post. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run. At the time of our inspection, there was no registered manager in post because they had left the service two weeks prior to our inspection visit. There was a new manager in post, however at the time of our visit, they were on annual leave. In the absence of the manager, their responsibilities were being overseen by the previous manager, two team leaders and the provider’s deputy operations manager.

People told us they felt safe using the service and staff understood how to protect people from abuse. There were processes to minimise risks associated with people’s care to keep them safe. This included the completion of risk assessments and checks on staff to ensure their suitability to work with people who used the service.

There were enough suitably trained staff to deliver care and support to people. A health professional we spoke with provided positive feedback about the care provided by staff. Staff received an induction and a programme of training to support them in meeting people’s needs effectively. Staff understood the principles of the Mental Capacity Act (MCA), they respected people’s decisions and gained people’s consent before they provided personal care.

People told us staff were kind and caring and had the right skills and experience to provide the care and support they required. Staff treated people in a way that respected their dignity and promoted their independence.

People were involved in planning how they were cared for and supported. Care was planned to meet people’s individual needs and preferences and care plans were reviewed. People knew how to complain and were able to share their views and opinions about the service they received.

Staff felt well supported by the registered manager and were confident they could raise any concerns or issues, knowing they would be listened to and acted on. There were checks in place to ensure good standards of care were maintained.

On the day of our visit we saw that people who lived in the home engaged in different activities throughout the day. For example three people went out supported by staff, to the local supermarket to buy the weekly groceries. Another person spent time in the garden. Another person watched their favourite programmes on television.

We saw that people's care plans were person centred and reflected their individual needs. We found that staff followed instructions within care plans when they supported people.

We found that people's bedrooms and communal areas of the home were personalised and had photos of the people who lived there.

We saw the provider ensured that the appropriate checks were undertaken before a new member of staff was employed. Staff we spoke with told us about their induction and about training they had received.

We found that there was a system for monitoring the quality of the service, which included audits by the provider.

Two people who lived at the home showed us their own rooms. We saw they had arranged their rooms and possessions in a way that suited them individually. In the care plans we looked at we saw that everyone had their own, individual goals for learning life skills and developing their independence.

We found that staff were trained to keep and administer medicines safely for people. Staff recorded when people took medicines, and staff understood why the medicines had been prescribed.

Staff we spoke with told us they felt supported by the manager because they had regular one to one meetings with them. One support worker told us, "Y is a great manager, I can talk to her at any time."

The care plans and staff records we looked at were kept in the manager's office, where staff could access them when they needed to. Confidential staff information was kept in a locked filing cabinet.