Care Specialist Services Ltd

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. This is the first assessment for this service. This key question has been rated Good. This meant people’s outcomes were consistently good, and people’s feedback confirmed this.

This service scored 71 (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 did not always make sure people’s care and treatment were effective because they did not always check and discuss people’s health, care, wellbeing and communication needs with them.

People’s care and support needs were assessed prior to them starting with the service. The registered manager visited people to ensure the service, was able to meet their needs. Information gathered was used to create people’s support plan. Improvements were needed to enhance the level of detail of the assessment. This would enable the service to write more person-centred support plans for people.

The registered manager told us they reviewed people’s support plans regularly or sooner if people’s needs had changed.

The provider planned and delivered people’s care and treatment with them, including what was important and mattered to them. They did this in line with legislation and current evidence-based good practice and standards.

The registered manager ensured staff were kept up to date with the relevant, evidence-based good practice, and required standards. This was through staff training and competency assessments carried out. People confirmed their nutrition and hydration needs were met. We spoke to 1 person and 1 relative who confirmed staff knew people’s food preferences and promoted good hydration. One person told us the staff made them a hot drink, when they arrived. The registered manager told us they kept a separate document of people’s food preferences, within people’s homes.

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.

Staff maintained clear communication with each other. A communication book was kept in people’s homes to share information about the person. Some people were also supported by another care service. Information was shared in the communication book about important information. This helped to promote continuity and make sure any changes in people’s health were identified quickly and responded to.

The provider 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.

Staff supported people to live healthier lives where possible. People’s needs were regularly reviewed, and the staff were aware, when people were not well. People’s support plans contained information about their medical conditions and how this affected them.

The provider 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.

Daily notes were written by the staff, which recorded information about people’s wellbeing and what personal care tasks were carried out. The registered manager audited these to make sure care was given as planned. Staff reported any concerns about people’s health to the registered manager. They discussed these with the person or relative. The registered manager regularly met with people using the service and their relatives. People’s care was reviewed, and any changes were made to support plans when needed.

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

The Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA) provides a legal framework for making particular decisions on behalf of people who may lack the mental capacity to do so for themselves. The Act requires that, as far as possible, people make their own decisions and are helped to do so when needed. When they lack mental capacity to take particular decisions, any made on their behalf must be in their best interests and as least restrictive as possible. During this assessment we looked at people’s care records, we checked whether the service was working within the principles of the MCA. Where necessary, mental capacity assessments were completed. This included for example, a mental capacity assessment carried out for a person, in relation to self-administering medicines.