HomeLink Healthcare Limited

Updated 19 February 2019

The inspection:

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team:

Our inspection was completed by one adult social care inspector.

Service and service type:

The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.’

Notice of inspection:

We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection visit because it is small and the manager is often out of the office supporting staff or providing care. We needed to be sure that they would be in.

Inspection site visit activity started on 22 January 2019 and ended on 25 January 2019. We visited the office location on both dates to see the manager and office staff and to review care records and policies and procedures.

What we did:

Our inspection was informed by evidence we already held about the service. We also checked for feedback we received from members of the public, local authorities and clinical. We checked records held by Companies House and the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). We asked the service to complete a Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make.

We telephoned one person, one relative and one person’s friend on 21 and 23 January 2019 to gather their feedback. We spoke with one registered general nurse, the nominated individual (person with overall responsibility for supervising the management of the regulated activity, and ensuring the quality of the services provided), registered manager, the administrator and the IT director. We sent 14 questionnaires to people using the service, staff members, and other healthcare agencies and received four responses.

We reviewed parts of three people's care records, three personnel files, two medicines administration records and other records about the management of the service. After our inspection, we asked the registered manager to send us further documents and we received and reviewed this information. This evidence was included as part of our inspection.

Updated 19 February 2019

About the service:

HomeLink Healthcare is a domiciliary nursing agency. It provides personal care and treatment of disease, disorder or injury to people living in their own homes. It provides a service to older adults, younger adults, people with dementia, people with a sensory impairment and people with a physical disability. At the time of our inspection five people used the service, supported by four permanent staff and seven regular bank staff. Two of the people using the service had commenced during our inspection site visits. For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk.

People’s experience of using this service:

• The service met the characteristics for a rating of "good" in all key questions.

• The service had developed processes to measure, document, improve and evaluate the quality of care.

• We have made a recommendation that the registered manager implements a system and audit-trail of their quality monitoring.

• People received personalised care which met their individual needs.

• People, relatives and other people involved in care and treatment told us that visits were timely and consistent.

• We have made a recommendation about the service monitoring and analysing visit times for trends across time.

• People and relatives told us the service was caring, well-led and respected their needs and preferences.

• People received safe, compassionate and high quality care.

• Staff were knowledgeable and experienced. They received appropriate training and support to ensure they could carry out their roles effectively.

• More information is in the full report.

Rating at last inspection:

This is our first inspection of the service since their registration with us.

Why we inspected:

This inspection was part of our routine scheduled plan of visiting services to check the safety and quality of care people received.

Follow up:

We will continue to monitor the service to ensure that people receive safe, high quality care. Further inspections will be planned for future dates.