Archived: Dale Care - South Tyneside (Homecare, Extra Care)

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.

This is the first assessment for this newly registered service. This key question has been rated 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 staff team always treated people with kindness, empathy and compassion and respected their privacy and dignity. Staff treated colleagues from other organisations with kindness and respect. One person said, “The girls are marvellous, so kind, they are so good to me and they do whatever I ask them too.”

Staff 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. One staff member said, “By listening to what they [Service users] share and tailoring my responses based on that. I also offer general advice based on common preferences and can ask questions to better understand their needs.”

Staff promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing. Staff we spoke with said they promote people’s independence and choice. Comments included, “I promote this [independence and choice] by always offering a choice and encouraging healthy and positive choices. Such as choice of meals, clothes, what they would like to talk about, how they like their personal care carried out” and “I promote independence by providing clear information, encouraging making, and helping with problem-solving. The goal is to empower individuals to make informed choices and take control of their own lives.”

Staff 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. One staff member said, “I make time to listen, if service user needs my help again it may run over the time and cause us to be late to the next call but that person’s wellbeing at the time is my priority.”

The provider did not always promote the wellbeing of their staff. They did not always support or enable staff to deliver person-centred care. Staff we spoke with said, “I feel we are not listened to” and “I feel like the office staff don’t care about our wellbeing and mental health.”

We passed these comments onto the provider who said, “Given the new staff we now have on board and given the staff feedback in relation to the office staff, we have started to compile an action plan which will ensure service user care calls including timings are looked at and adjustments made to ensure we meet the expectations and needs of the service users. This will also have an impact on the care worker’s rotas as we will be able to provide service users and care workers with consistent rotas and times of calls. This will help building relationships between office staff, care workers and service users. This will also ensure that staff and service users do not feel rushed.”