The Beach

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 requires improvement. At this assessment the rating has changed to good. This meant people’s outcomes were consistently good, and people’s feedback confirmed this.

Managers made transition plans when people moved between services. They worked with other professionals to help ensure care was consistent and information shared appropriately. When required, concerns about people’s health and well-being were raised with other agencies. Staff encouraged people to live a healthy lifestyle, even when people were resistant to 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.

There was evidence people were involved in decision making and care plans reflected their needs. Staff told us there were systems to keep them up to date with any changes in people’s needs. This included handovers, a communication book and daily logs.

When new people moved into the service there was information for staff to help them get to know people. People’s history and experiences were taken into account when planning care.

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.

People had keyworkers who knew them well. They shared information with the wider staff team so staff would be aware if people’s needs changed. The manager was in the process of asking people to say if they wanted a change to their keyworker and who they would prefer this to be.

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.

The service was working closely with another provider to support a move between services for one person. The new staff team were shadowing staff who knew the person well. Relevant information about how to support the person was being shared.

Care plans contained information about people’s health needs. These were updated to reflect any changes in needs. Information was shared between professionals to help ensure continuity of care. Visits by health and social care professionals were recorded. A visiting professional told us staff shared information appropriately and acted on any guidance they provided.

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.

People were given information about how to live a healthy lifestyle and encouraged to follow good practice guidelines. For example, they ensured healthy snacks were available to people. One person’s care plan described how they would choose to eat unhealthy foods. Staff were directed to add healthy options to the person’s plate as they would sometimes eat them if offered in this way. When people were reluctant to maintain a healthy diet staff monitored their health and shared information with other professionals appropriately. Staff ensured people routinely attended annual health and screening checks. Relatives told us their family members were supported to visit GP’s and opticians. One commented, “Medical appointments are really good and they follow up well.” One relative raised a concern about access to a dentist. We discussed this with managers who said they were aware of the problems and were supporting the person to address this.

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.

Monitoring records were kept where appropriate, however, information about people’s height had not always been accurately recorded leading to inaccurate BMI scores. This had been identified by the provider and the most recent records were accurate. Care plans included information about indicators of pain. Staff knew people well and were able to recognise if they were feeling unwell.

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

People were treated with respect and were offered choices about how and where they spent their time.

At our previous inspection we found capacity assessments for specific decisions had not been completed. At this inspection the issue had been resolved and mental capacity assessments had been completed covering a range of subjects, for example medicine administration and finances. The assessments were meaningful and there was evidence people had been supported to understand information relating to specific decisions.