Dimensions South West Counties Domiciliary Care Office

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.

We saw people being supported by staff who knew them well and treated them with kindness. One relative told us staff were “compassionate and caring”, another family member said “they are amazing”

The provider did not always treat people as individuals or make sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. They did not always take account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics.

Some people were not being supported in a way that took in to account their cultural background.

One person told us how they liked food cooked in the same way their parent cooked, which was in line with their culture. However, during this inspection we heard they were not supported to cook this type of food in their home. This meant her cultural needs were not being supported appropriately by staff. Other people in a shared home were not given choices in relation to what they wanted to eat, nor when and where. This meant people were not being supported to have choice and control in their daily lives.

Other homes we visited ensured people were treated as individuals. We saw people had personalised support plans.

The provider promoted people’s independence. People knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing. People told us staff supported them to be as independent as possible.

The provider had a council of service users which people could join to work with the provider to improve support: this enabled people to have an influence on how support was provided. One person attended a day service: they were given the choice of whether they wanted to go, and that choice was respected by staff.

Care plans described what people could do and how they liked to be supported.

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.

Staff knew people well and listened to people and acted when needed. We saw 1 person engaging with by a member of staff who responded to their wishes in a respectful and timely way.

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

The provider had several registered managers in post to cover the houses across Wiltshire, Bath and Bristol. Staff we spoke to said they felt well supported by their managers and that their concerns were usually acted upon. One staff member told us they wanted more supervisions, and another said they raised concerns, but these had not always been addressed by managers.