The Care Quality Commission
  • Community
  • Community substance misuse service

STARS (Southend Treatment and Recovery Service)

Overall: Good read more about inspection ratings

25-27, Weston Road, Southend-on-sea, SS1 1AS (01702) 431889

Provided and run by:
The Forward Trust

Important: The provider of this service changed. See old profile

All Inspections

During an assessment of Community-based substance misuse services

Southend Treatment and Recovery Service (STARS) was inspected on 10 February 2026. STARS, run by the Forward Trust is a community-based substance misuse service. The Forward Trust operates over 70 projects, helping more than 20,000 people each year through community services and prison programmes. It offers advice, treatment, and recovery support, including abstinence-based programmes in community, residential, prison, and online settings. The service also helps individuals build employability skills through training, job support, and business guidance.

STARS provide support to adult residents in Southend-on Sea, impacted by drugs and alcohol. The service offers brief therapeutic interventions, on a one a one basis or in structured groups alongside clinical support with ambulatory detox (an outpatient detox from drugs and alcohol providing assessment, prescriptions, and monitoring) for people. The service also prescribes opiate substitute medication and offers outreach support, a rough sleepers initiative, prison in-reach, a needle exchange, blood borne virus and Hepatitis B vaccinations and naloxone training. Services are aimed at recovery and rehabilitation and include assessment, information, advice, treatment, and referral for residents of Southend-on-Sea.

This service was registered by CQC on 6 May 2022. At the time of inspection, the service had a registered manager and nominated individual. The service was registered to provide treatment of disease, disorder, or injury. This was our second comprehensive inspection of the service, across all key questions and quality statements. We last inspected this service in 2023 where it was rated good overall and for each key question except for effective which was rated as requires improvement. We identified a breach at that inspection for person centred care as the service did not ensure that all people’s files included a documented record of unexpected exit from treatment plans. At this inspection, the service had made improvements and was no longer in breach of regulations. Managers now ensured that staff documented unexpected exit from treatment plans. We rated the service as good overall.

During an assessment of the hospital overall

This means we looked for evidence that people were protected from abuse and avoidable harm.

At our last assessment we rated this key question good. At this assessment the rating has remained as good.

The service was safe and clean although some areas of the service were disorganised with items not stored appropriately. Staff assessed and managed risks to people and themselves well and protected people from abuse. The service safely managed medicines and managed safety incidents well. Physical health was managed well, there was access to a range of specialists and staff worked well together. Staff treated people with compassion and kindness, they understood the individual needs of people and involved people in care planning and risk assessment. People could access the service immediately and people at increased risks were prioritised. Staff supported people to engage with activities, and supported people with communication, cultural and advocacy needs. The service responded to and investigated complaints and learned lessons. Leaders had the skills, knowledge and experience to perform their roles, governance processes operated effectively and performance and risk were managed well.

06 June 2023

During a routine inspection

This was our first inspection of this service. We rated it as good because:

  • The service provided safe care. The premises where clients were seen were safe and clean. The number of clients on the caseload of the teams, and of individual members of staff, was not too high to prevent staff from giving each client the time they needed. Staff assessed and managed risk well and followed good practice with respect to safeguarding.
  • Staff developed holistic, recovery-oriented care plans informed by a comprehensive assessment. They provided a range of treatments suitable to the needs of the clients and in line with national guidance about best practice. Staff engaged in clinical audit to evaluate the quality of care they provided.
  • The teams included or had access to the full range of specialists required to meet the needs of clients under their care. Managers ensured that these staff received training, supervision, and appraisal. Staff worked well together as a multidisciplinary team and with relevant services outside the organisation.
  • Staff treated clients with compassion and kindness and understood the individual needs of clients. They actively involved clients in decisions and care planning.
  • The service was easy to access. Staff planned and managed discharge well and had alternative pathways for people whose needs it could not meet.
  • The service was well led, and the governance processes ensured that its procedures ran smoothly.

However:

  • The service had out of date stock located in the needle exchange room. We found 12 boxes of out-of-date needles. However, these were stored in a locked cupboard and were disposed of during inspection.
  • The service did not have a formal process for recording clients contact preferences if they disengaged from treatment. However, they had informal conversations with clients about how they would like to be contacted should they unexpectedly exit treatment before their treatment was completed.