Baycroft Flitwick

On this page

• Overview
• Person-centred Care
• Care provision, Integration and continuity
• Providing Information
• Listening to and involving people
• Equity in access
• Equity in experiences and outcomes
• Planning for the future

Responsive – this means we looked for evidence that the provider met people’s needs.

At our last inspection we rated this key question good. At this inspection, the rating has remained good. This meant people’s needs were met through good organisation and delivery.

This service scored 72 (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 and staff team did not always make sure people received person-centred care that was in line with their preferences, likes and dislikes. We observed people to go for long periods of time without meaningful engagement from the staff team. If people did not like the social past time on offer (such as dancing or bingo) it was not apparent what other choices were on offer in line with people’s preferences. Some areas of people’s care plans would have benefitted from being more detailed in relation to specifically how people’s support needs impacted on how they liked to be treated. One person said, ‘‘I spend a lot of time in my room.’’ A relative told us, ‘‘I do worry sometimes that [family member] is by themselves a lot. I feel I need to visit to make sure they have something to do.’’

However, staff were able to tell us how people liked to be supported and clearly knew people well. People and relatives were positive about how they were supported. One person said, ‘‘I cannot fault living here. Its great and all the staff are really friendly.’’ A relative told us, ‘‘I would describe the support from the staff team as amazing. [Family member] needs a lot of support and we feel lucky they are in the right place.’’

The provider understood the diverse health and care needs of people and their local communities, so care was joined-up, flexible and supported choice and continuity. Staff understood and respected people’s cultural support needs, in relation to the food they chose to eat and the religious practices they wished to follow. The staff team was consistent, so people knew who was supporting them and had good continuity of care. The management team had recently tried to make sure the same staff worked on the same floor of the service to promote consistency. One person said, ‘‘We have the opportunity to go out on the minibus quite a lot. We have lots of coffee mornings too.’’ A relative told us ‘‘The service went through a period where there were a lot of different [staff] faces. However, things are settling down and I recognise most of them now.’’

The provider did not always supply appropriate, accurate and up-to-date information in formats that were tailored to individual needs. Whilst forms of communication such as pictures and objects were available to support people, they were not consistently used by the staff team. We observed staff trying to ask people what they wanted for lunch and people were noticeably confused about what was being offered. People would have benefitted from having support to communicate at these times. Documents such as care plans and meeting minutes with people were not always available in ways all people would understand.

However, we observed staff speaking with people in a slow and relaxed way to help make sure people understood what was being communicated with them. People and relatives were invited to meetings to discuss what was happening at the service so information could be shared with them. Staff had daily handovers to discuss how people’s support needs may have changed or any other information they needed to know. One person said, ‘‘[Staff] will sit and speak with me about what is going on and ask me how I am.’’ A relative told us, ‘‘I have no problem with anything that is happening at the service, and we get told what is going on regularly.’’

The provider made it easy for people to share feedback and ideas, or raise complaints about their care, treatment, and support, however, could continue to improve in this area. People were invited to feed back in meetings however these were only attended by a small number of people who were able to feedback verbally. It was not clear how people who found it more difficult to communicate their needs were being supported to feed back about the service in a meaningful way. The management team listened to our feedback about this and showed us how they would start collecting this feedback from people.

Other people fed back about the service in regular meetings. People and their relatives were given the opportunity to be involved in discussing care plans and risk assessments. One person said, ‘‘We have lots of chats about how things are going, and staff always listen.’’ A relative told us, ‘‘We have reviews about [family members] care plans fairly regularly but I can always get a hold of someone if I need to at any time.’’

The provider made sure that people could access the care, support, and treatment they needed when they needed it. Staff supported people to contact health professionals such as GP’s or speech and language therapists if necessary and supported them to attend appointments with these professionals. Professionals were positive about how the staff team worked with them to support people.

People’s experiences and outcomes were not always positive or consistent. It was not always clear how people were being supported to discuss what outcomes they wanted to achieve or how staff were supporting them to achieve these. It was also unclear how some people were being supported to follow their identified interests and pastimes. Whilst there were opportunities for people to be involved in social engagement, this did not always interest people. One person said, ‘‘It can be a bit boring at times. I do not like to [do past time] all the time and this is sometimes all that is on offer.’’ As a result of sometimes going longer periods of time without staff interaction, people’s experiences at the service were sometimes not as positive as it could be. The management team were responsive to our findings and sent us assurances they were starting to address this with the staff team.

However, we also observed some people to enjoy the social past times on offer such as playing bingo, going out for coffee, or playing games with the staff team. One person said, ‘‘It is a good laugh here. The staff make sure there is always something for us to do.’’ There was also evidence some people had experienced good outcomes. For example, not developing new pressure sores or maintaining healthy weights whilst being supported at the service. One relative said, ‘‘[Family member] didn’t do a lot before they started living at the service but now out of nowhere, they take part in lots of different things. The staff have really helped them to come out of their shell.’’

People were incredibly well supported to plan for important life changes, so they could have enough time to make informed decisions about their future, including at the end of their life. People’s care plans contained exceptionally detailed information about how people would like to be supported at the end of their life. These gave the best guidance possible for staff about what people’s preferences were at the end of their life and their specific preferences and wishes. These details were very personalised and stated minute details such as the sort of flowers and music people wanted at their funeral when they passed away. This meant staff had all the information they needed to make sure people received extremely personalised care at this time of their lives.

Staff had an excellent understanding of how to support people with dignity and respect at this time and who to contact for further help if needed. They also understood the importance of supporting people’s relatives and other people living at the service who may have been friends with the person who passed away. A staff member said, ‘‘This is people’s last home, and we know how important it is to make sure they have everything they need when they pass away. It is our way of making sure they are remembered in the way they wanted to be.’’ Staff organised with funeral directors for there to be a sendoff for the person in which the funeral director visited the service and held a wake for the person. People using the service who knew the person and their relatives and friends were invited to these. We observed these to be a meaningful and respectful way of meeting people’s preferences at the end of their life. One person told us, ‘‘I miss [person] a lot and it helped to say goodbye.’’ Relatives were especially complimentary of how the service supported their loved ones at the end of their life and we saw a lot of testimonials thanking the staff team for their support at this time.