Updated 26 April 2019
The inspection:
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.
Inspection team:
One adult social care inspector carried out this inspection.
Service and service type:
This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own homes. Not everyone using this service receives regulated activity; CQC only inspects the service being received by people provided with ‘personal care’; help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also take into account any wider social care provided.
The registered provider was an individual who managed the service on a day to day basis. Registered providers 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.
Notice of inspection:
We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection visit because it is small and the registered provider is often out of the office supporting staff or providing care. We needed to be sure they would be available to speak with us. We also requested to pre-arrange home visits to meet with people who used the service.
Inspection site visit activity started on 06 March 2019 and ended on 06 March 2019. We visited the office location on 06 March 2019 to see the registered provider and the management team; and to review care records, policies and procedures. Additionally, we visited two people, with their permission, at their homes. On the second day on 13 March 2019, we spoke with people supported by the service and staff by telephone.
What we did:
Prior to our inspection we looked at all the information we held about the service. This included notifications we had received from the registered provider, about incidents that affect the health, safety and welfare of people supported by the service and previous inspection reports. We also spoke with the contracts team at the local authority. We received no information of concern.
As part of the inspection we used information the provider sent us in the Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We used a planning tool to collate all this evidence and information prior to visiting the service.
During the inspection we spoke with four members of staff and the registered provider. We also spoke with a health professional, four people who were supported by Elite Social Care Limited and two relatives. Following the inspection, we received positive feedback from a relative through our Share Your Experience facility on our website.
To gather information, we looked at a variety of records. This included care records related to three people who used the service. We also looked at other information related to the management of the service. We did this to ensure the management team had oversight of the service and they could respond to any concerns highlighted or lead Elite Social Care Limited in ongoing improvements.