Archived: Sutton House

At the last inspection in June 2016 we found breaches of legal requirements relating to medicines management and good governance. At this inspection we found improvements had been made to meet the relevant requirements and the service was no longer in breach of regulations.

This service provides care and support to 19 people living in a ‘supported living’ setting, so that they can live as independently as possible. People’s care and housing are provided under separate contractual agreements. CQC does not regulate premises used for supported living; this inspection looked at people’s personal care and support.

There was a registered manager in position. 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.

People told us they felt safe living at Sutton House. Staff were trained to recognise and report signs of abuse and understood their role in keeping people safe. Accidents and incidents were documented with actions and analysis to mitigate the risk of recurrence. Risks to people were assessed and associated plans of care put in place.

Sufficient staff were deployed to keep people safe and people told us care and support visits were made in line with their care needs. They said staff generally arrived on time and stayed for the correct amount of time. Staff gave examples of where they visited people on top of regular calls to offer extra care and support if people were upset or to remind them of cultural fasting times. A robust recruitment process was in place and staff received regular training, supervision and appraisal.

Staff used gloves and aprons when carrying out personal care tasks to help reduce the spread of infection.

People were supported with their health care needs. We saw a range of health care professionals visited the service when required and people were supported to attend health care appointments in the community. This was reflected in people's care plans.

People were supported with shopping, preparing and cooking meals and cultural needs were respected. An emphasis was placed on retaining as much independence as possible and people were supported to maintain links with the outside community.

People's needs were assessed prior to commencement of the service and people were involved in the planning and review of their care. Personalised care plans were in place and these were regularly updated or when care and support needs changed. The service had accessible information in place and had plans in place to increase this with new care plan structures.

The service was compliant with the legal requirements of the Mental Capacity Act and the registered manager understood their responsibilities under the Act. This helped to ensure people’s rights were protected.

People told us staff were caring and supportive. Staff respected people's privacy and dignity, knocking on people's apartment doors prior to entering and asking consent before care and support tasks. We saw the service respected the diverse interests and cultures of the people living at the service and saw no evidence of discrimination during the inspection. We saw good relationships had developed between people and staff and staff knew people and their care and support needs.

An easy read complaints procedure was in place and people told us they knew what to do if they had any concerns. However, people told us they had not needed to complain about any aspect of the service. We saw the registered manager and deputy manager had a good relationship with people and had an 'open door' policy to discuss any day to day worries.

There was an open and transparent culture at Sutton House. People respected the management team and found them approachable. Staff told us they felt supported in their roles and their views were listened to through surveys and team meetings.

People were involved with the service through questionnaires and regular meetings. We saw they had been involved in discussions about the future direction of the service and improvements to be made.

This was the first inspection of the service since registration.

Sutton House provides a personal care service to people living in their own one bedroomed apartment. The building has two storeys, with a communal lounge and office on the ground floor and gardens surrounding the property. The service is situated approximately three miles from Bradford city centre. On the day of the inspection, there were 18 people receiving personal care from the service.

There was a registered manager in position. 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.

People told us they felt safe living at Sutton House and visitors and social care professionals told us they thought people were safe. Notifications about safeguarding had been made to the Care Quality Commission and the local authority in a timely manner. Staff understood the different types of abuse and were confident any concerns they reported would be dealt with appropriately.

Risks were managed appropriately and measures were in place to mitigate and reduce any risks to the people that lived at the service.

Medicines were stored safely and securely in each person's apartment. However systems for managing and administering medicines were not always safe.

Accidents and incidents were reported although analysis and action plans were not always completed following these.

We concluded sufficient numbers of staff were employed to ensure people received safe and consistent care. The service had recently recruited additional staff to cover any vacancies.

Staff had received training in order to carry out their roles. However, we found gaps in some areas and a lack of refresher training in place.

Staff had good working relationships with local healthcare and social care professionals and worked with them to ensure people's individual needs were met.

People told us staff were caring and kind and provided a good standard of care.

People were cared for by regular staff who knew them well which enabled staff to develop a good understanding of how to support people's individual needs. Staff encouraged and worked with people to increase their independence.

We saw the service was flexible and responsive to people's individual needs and circumstances.

We found the staff and registered manager committed and passionate about providing high quality care and the registered manager leading by example.

People's views were sought through regular tenants meetings and quality surveys.

There was a lack of robust systems and processes to audit the quality of care provided, such as the medicines management system, care records, complaints and incidents.

We identified two breaches of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014. You can see what action we told the provider to take at the back of the full version of the report.