Creative Support - Morecambe Service

On this page

• Overview
• Assessing needs
• Delivering evidence-based care and treatment
• How staff, teams and services work together
• Supporting people to live healthier lives
• Monitoring and improving outcomes
• Consent to care and treatment

Effective – this means we looked for evidence that people’s care, treatment and support achieved good outcomes and promoted a good quality of life, based on best available evidence.

At our last assessment we rated this key question good. At this assessment the rating has remained good. This meant people’s outcomes were consistently good, and people’s feedback confirmed this.

This service scored 75 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

The provider made sure people’s care and treatment was effective by assessing and reviewing their health, care, wellbeing and communication needs with them.

Although some care plans had not been reviewed in line with the service’s policy, or contained some outdated or conflicting information, when the inspection team informed the service about this, they rectified them straight away and showed us evidence of how they did this.

The service ensured care, treatment and support was delivered in line with legislation and current evidence-based good practice and standards.

Staff supported people to have enough to eat and drink to prevent malnutrition or dehydration and supported them to manage their dietary needs and associated risks. One staff member told us, “[Person] has a [medical condition] and because of this we make sure their food is cut up [to support with digestion].” Another staff member told us, “We sit with [person] and help them to eat and drink safely as they are at risk of choking. We have not had any choking incidents as we support [person] really well, but I know how to manage and escalate choking episodes due to our training.”

Care plans included people’s safe swallowing guidelines and we observed staff following them while supporting the people to eat.

The provider worked well across teams and services to support people. They made sure people only needed to tell their story once by sharing their assessment of needs when people moved between different services.

Although we received some negative feedback from 1 professional about how staff in 1 home worked with them and from 1 relative about communication from staff and the management team, feedback was mostly positive. We saw examples of where the provider worked well with health and social care partners to ensure people’s needs were met.

The service supported people to manage their health and wellbeing to maximise their independence, choice and control. Staff supported people to live healthier lives and where possible, reduce their future needs for care and support.

We saw evidence the service sought support from healthcare professionals when they identified people could benefit from this. When people were unwell, records showed that staff facilitated access to the GP quickly.

One relative told us, “[Person] is under [specialist health service] and also visits the dentist occasionally. We are currently waiting for results from recent tests.” One staff member told us, “[Person] keeps recovering really well from illness. We have doctors, district nurses and chiropodists visiting. We are currently encouraging them to walk more to improve circulation.”

The service routinely monitored people’s care and treatment to continuously improve it. They ensured that outcomes were positive and consistent, and that they met both clinical expectations and the expectations of people themselves.

Where people had specific health conditions, care plans included information to guide staff how to identify symptoms or issues and when to escalate concerns to specialist health professionals. External professionals monitored people’s health risks such as diabetes, kidney or heart related symptoms.

Where one person had started experiencing a change in their health, staff monitored and recorded this clearly and in detail and had requested a referral to the specialist health department or the specialist nurse. Training in the condition was being arranged for the staff supporting them and some staff had completed this by the time of our inspection.

People were supported to maintain a good quality of life and to achieve positive outcomes. One relative told us, “Since [person] moved to the house, they have had more interactions with people and their quality of life improved vastly.” Another relative said, “[Person] is a lot better in themself and seems to enjoy where they are living.”

The service told people about their rights around consent and respected these when delivering person-centred care and treatment.

Staff sought people’s consent about their care. One staff member told us, “[Person] is able to verbalise whether they consent or not about their care and they can make their own choices.” One relative told us, “[Person] does not have capacity, but staff would ask us if they needed consent for anything.”

People’s records contained numerous assessments of their capacity to understand and make decisions about their support. Where people did not have the capacity to understand and make decisions about their support, there were records of decisions made in their best interests.