Shrewsbury Road - Max Potential

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 75 (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.

All of the feedback we received about the care provided at the home was positive. One relative said, “They are genuinely caring for the people who live there. They really do care. (Person) is always immaculately dressed and cared for. He always liked to be well dressed.” Another relative said, “Staff are so welcoming and very kind. We all went out for a meal together, it was lovely. The staff make such a fuss of [person]. I have no concerns about this service whatsoever.”

We observed lots of kind, friendly interactions between staff and people living at the home. For example, we observed staff sitting quietly with people in communal areas either watching television, or whilst people were enjoying doing arts and crafts activities. One relative said, “The staff have got to know him. If he's not coping they understand how to speak to him.”

Staff understood the importance of ensuring people were treated with dignity and respect at all times. One member of staff said, “We assist people with personal care when required. We try to make sure people have baths and showers at different times to preserve dignity, as well as ensuring doors are always closed.”

The registered manager told us about several instances where they had provided high quality care and support to people living at the home, enabling positive outcomes for people. In one instance, they had personally driven one person on long car journeys each day to visit a family member who they were extremely close with. This had helped maintain the relationship with this family member and ensure the person’s wellbeing did not decline as a result.

The provider 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.

We found people’s individual choices and preferences were documented within their care plans. Staff knew people well and told us about their routines and things they enjoyed. One member of staff said, “Everybody living here really enjoys going to day centre, so we go there a lot. One person also enjoys going to the library, so that is where we go.”

People had been able to personalise their living spaces with things of importance to them. For example, one person liked collecting model trains and we saw they were on display in a cabinet in their bedroom. If people required specific diets for cultural reasons, we saw this was provided and clearly documented in their care plan.

Where people had specific cultural, religious or social needs were saw these were accommodated by the staff team. For example, one person had always enjoyed going to church with family and therefore had religious pictures displayed in their bedroom which was important to them.

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

People were encouraged to be independent where possible and care plans provided details about things people could do without staff support. Staff understood about how to promote people’s independence and told us about how they involved them in the support they received with tasks such as personal care, shopping, cleaning and aspects of food preparation.

We saw people had choice and control over how they spent their day. For example, we observed people sitting quietly in their bedroom or doing arts and crafts in communal areas. Although people weren’t able to go out into the community alone, staff supported people to access various places in the community regularly.

People living at Shrewsbury Road had access to a range of activities and the provider Max Potential operated a day centre close to the home which people could use free of charge. We visited the day centre as part of our inspection and saw people taking playing skittles, pool, air hockey and using the computers. People also went into Bolton town centre or visited local parks. One person said to us, “I like going to the library.”

There were no restrictions on visiting arrangement and relatives said they were able to visit people regularly. Alternatively, people also went back to their original home on occasions to spend time with family. One relative said, “[Person] came home for their birthday. We had a party here and he was happy to be back.”

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.

There was clear guidance in place showing how staff should respond if people’s mental or physical wellbeing deteriorated, and staff we spoke to were confident in the signs they would look out for. For example, they knew what might trigger a person to become anxious and distressed and how to respond in a person-centred way to reassure them.

Staff were confident in using their own judgement to seek emergency medical advice if needed, rather than to delay people’s access to important care by having to ask management first (who sometimes worked at other sites). Although there hadn’t been any occasions where staff had needed to do this, they said they would not hesitate to call emergency services if needed and support people to go to hospital. On call arrangements were also in place.

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

Staff told us they felt management had a high regard for staff well-being within the service. One member of staff said to us, “Management take it very seriously. I have a family member who has a specific health condition and they are very accommodating at letting me attend any appointments. I needed to attend a school parents evening recently and this was not a problem for me to change my shifts and attend this.”

Lone working measures were used and risk assessments were in place detailing out of hours emergency contact information and on call information. CCTV was used in the building to monitor the safety of staff and review any incidents.

There were regular staff meals, where staff were invited to spend time with one another, outside of a workplace setting. All staff are offered free meals during their shift, which the registered manager said led to increased harmony amongst the team.