Affinity Trust Specialist Division South

On this page

• Overview
• Kindness, compassion and dignity
• Treating people as individuals
• Independence, choice and control
• Responding to people’s immediate needs
• Workforce wellbeing and enablement

Caring – this means we looked for evidence that the provider involved people and treated them with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect.

At our last assessment we rated this key question good. At this assessment the rating has remained good. This meant people were supported and treated with dignity and respect; and involved as partners in their care.

This service scored 70 (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 always treated people with kindness, empathy and compassion and respected their privacy and dignity. Staff treated colleagues from other organisations with kindness and respect. People and relatives told us they felt the staff were caring. A person told us, “I like [staff member] and trust them as they listen to me and sort things out.” There was a clear culture of kindness and respect across the staff and management team. All the staff team were committed and motivated to deliver care and support through genuine connections with people and good communication. All staff spoke about people with genuine compassion and kindness. People confirmed their privacy was being respected and we saw this when we visited people. People’s care plans included guidance for staff in how to ensure people’s privacy whilst providing care and how to recognise when people needed their own space.

The provider treated people as individuals and made sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. They took account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics.

People’s care plans included information about their backgrounds and preferences. This helped staff to understand people’s unique and diverse needs and to talk people about their interests. People were supported by a regular staff team who knew them well. We found staff were knowledgeable about people’s individual needs and how to meet them. For example, staff told us, “When we first started supporting [Name] it was very intense; they were not settled at that time. Now they have got to know us, over the years we've built trust with them. They have confidence to come to us now and we have confidence to go to them. [Name] sees some staff and jumps to show they are happy." People’s support plans included their goals and aspirations, and they were supported to work towards and achieve these. For example, a person was working towards losing weight and another person was developing relationship skills. Records showed staff met with people regularly to assess if they had completed goals or had the right support to work towards them.

The provider promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing. People’s care plans identified people’s levels of independence and how staff should provide support when needed. This helped people to retain choice and control over their care and support.

A person told us, “My goal is to live more independently with staff just popping in rather than here all the time. Staff are supporting me to learn more new skills and build confidence to achieve this.” Some people and relatives expressed concern regarding a shortage of car drivers to support people to go out into the community and a shortage of support hours for some people. They told us, “I am out a lot. I get very frustrated when there are no drivers or someone who is a driver cancels and then I can’t go out where I want to. It makes me worried and angry” and “Staff will say [Name] is doing something but then there is no driver; it happens a lot. [Name] gets mad and thinks I should sort it out. I don’t know what the problem is but it keeps happening and makes [Name] very upset which could be avoided.” We raised this with the provider who was aware of the concerns and working to resolve them through staff recruitment.

The provider listened to and understood people’s needs, views and wishes. Staff responded to people’s needs in the moment and acted to minimise any discomfort, concern or distress. People’s care plans included information around their preferred communication methods and how to identify and intervene at an early stage when people showed signs of distress. We saw staff were consistently responsive to people’s needs including sitting with them when staff identified they needed reassurance, responding to requests to go out and providing people with information when they needed it. A staff member told us, "[Name] struggles to verbalise what they want. We look at their body language, signs, how they are using their hands and what noises they are making including different tones. [Name] points in a different type of way, takes your hand and pulls you to what they want or does a certain action. I can tell the difference between these and identify what [Name] wants.”

The provider cared about and promoted the wellbeing of their staff and supported and enabled staff to always deliver person-centred care.

Staff reported the provider respected and valued their wellbeing and supported them in their roles. Staff reported no concerns about their working hours and explained they were provided with a rota which included breaks and days off. Staff comments included, “I feel the leadership has improved how it supports staff. For example, recognising the impact of high-level incidents on staff well being and supporting staff on an individual basis” and “Our manager is really good in supporting staff with wellbeing. A lot of the staff I work with have children and the staff team are really good at helping each other out."