Closer Care Services - Main 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.

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 65 (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.

Relatives provided lovely feedback about staff, with feedback recording staff were kind, caring and considerate. One relative explained their family member had required care for a long time, and this was, “the best care agency by far” and staff were, “a breath of fresh air.”

Another relative stated, “We are extremely happy with the company, no issues."

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.

Care plans were not always person-centred and did not focus on the person, their goals, wishes and outcomes. The provider was unable to demonstrate they were operating in line with the Right support, Right care, Right culture guidance.

Feedback from relatives was generally positive, with a relative telling us, “The way [staff] interact with my [family member] because [they are] heard of hearing, and last year we found out they had dementia also, they are very patient with [them] and very caring so that is brilliant."

The provider promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing.

Relatives told us they were offered choice and had control over the decisions being made by care staff.

People were supported with activities, such as walking, or going to the day centre. Staff engaged well with people to understand their needs and what was important to them. One relative said, “They engage with [family member], I can hear [family member] laughing, we have had a lot of hardship recently and [family member] looks forward to staff coming.”

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 and their relatives told us staff were usually on time for visits and were reliable.

We saw evidence of the same small group of staff attending to people’s care visits to enable them to get to know the person well.

One relative explained their family member was very relaxed with staff, however this had not been the case with previous care agencies. The relative felt the improvement had been because staff had really got to know their family member. The relative stated, “[Family member’s] behaviour has been so good with these carers, [family member] used to shout when previous care agency staff came, but now [they] are always calm.”

Whilst the provider cared about and promoted the wellbeing of their staff, they did not always support or enable staff to deliver person-centred care.

The staff we spoke with told us they were happy working for Closer Care Services. However, the lack of oversight in maintaining training, the inflexibility of training being available in alternative formats or languages, and the lack of regular supervisions for all staff, along with conflicting information in care plans and risk assessments meant staff were not always enabled to deliver person centred care.