Archived: Cancare Home Services Limited

Updated 27 June 2017

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection checked whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

This inspection was a focused inspection which took place on 24 February 2017, to check actions the provider told us they had taken since the last inspection and obtain a current view of the breaches of regulations. We gave 24 hours’ notice to ensure the provider was available for us to speak with. This inspection was undertaken by one inspector.

The provider did not complete a Provider Information Return (PIR). This is a form that asks the provider to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. This was due to the short notice of the inspection.

During the inspection we reviewed people’s records and a variety of documents. These included six people’s assessments, care plans and risk assessments and people’s daily records made by staff, the complaints procedure and written compliment feedback from people and all staff recruitment records.

We visited the office and spoke with the provider and an advisor that was present.

Updated 27 June 2017

The inspection took place on 24 February 2017, and was an announced inspection. The provider was given 24 hours’ notice of the inspection.

Cancare Home Services was established in 1995 and is a very small service. The main part of the service is a domestic service, which is not part of the registration. Cancare provide short visits to older people who require personal care. The service provides care and support to people in Canterbury, Herne Bay and surrounding areas. Since our comprehensive inspection in January 2017 the number of people receiving a service had reduced to six and the five members of the care staff team were unchanged.

We carried out a comprehensive inspection of this service on 17 and 18 January 2017. Eight breaches of legal requirements were found relating to medicine management, care planning, assessment and managing risks associated with people’s care and support, a lack of understanding and following the principles of the Mental Capacity Act 2005, having effective systems for complaints, safeguarding people from abuse and ensuring compliance with the regulations and lack of proper procedures relating to recruitment, training and supervision of staff.

After the comprehensive inspection the provider wrote to us on 22 February 2017 to advise what action they had taken since the inspection in order to keep people safe and meet the regulations.

We undertook this focused inspection to check those actions and obtain a current view of the breaches.. You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the 'all reports' link for Cancare Home Services Limited on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

The service did not have a registered manager, which is a legal requirement. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they 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. Since our comprehensive inspection in January an application to register a manager had been received and was being processed by the Commission.

Each person had their needs assessed and a care plan in place. However needs assessments contain only basic information and care plans lacked the detail about people wishes, preferences or what they could do independently.

Each person had risk assessments in place. However not all risks associated with people’s care and support had been assessed and actions to keep people safe had not been recorded.

There remained a lack of safeguarding procedures and the provider and staff had not received up to date training to help them understand and recognise abuse and neglect and keep people safe.

People were not protected by robust recruitment procedures and staff had not received appropriate training, support or appraisals to ensure they carried out their role effectively.

People had received a copy of the complaints procedure, but this lacked key information. For example, a timescale when the provider would respond and what action people could take if they were not satisfied with how their complaint had been handled.

People had been contacted following the last inspection by the provider to advise of the inspection findings and gather their feedback about the service they received.

Since the last inspection the provider had stopped all medicine administration including the application of creams and therefore the one restriction in place regarding medicines had been removed.

There remained an open and positive atmosphere in the office and the provider was committed to ensuring people received good care and support. However they continued to lack a full understanding of the regulations and compliance. Copies of care plans and risk assessments were now available for inspection within the office.

People’s need were met by sufficient numbers of staff.