Eleanor Nursing and Social Care Ltd - Leegate Office

Updated 23 January 2020

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. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by three inspectors and one Expert by Experience. An Expert by Experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

Service and service type

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own homes.

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. This was because we needed to be sure that the management team would be in the office to support the inspection.

Inspection activity started on 4 December 2019 and ended on 3 January 2020. We visited the office location on 4, 5 and 6 December 2019.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed the information the CQC held about the service. This included notifications of significant incidents reported to the CQC and the previous inspection report. We received feedback from local commissioners. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return. This is information providers are required to send us with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. This information helps support our inspections. We used all of this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with the service support manager, the registered manager, the operations director, branch auditor and 14 care workers. We spoke with 18 people and 9 relatives. We reviewed a range of records, including 25 people's care records and medicines records. We looked at six staff files and various records relating to the running of the service, including safeguarding and quality assurance records.

After the inspection

We continued to seek clarification from the provider to validate evidence found. We reviewed policies and procedures. We sought feedback from professionals.

Updated 23 January 2020

About the service

Eleanor Nursing and Social Care Ltd - Leegate Office is a domiciliary care service. It provides care to people living in their own homes. At the time of our inspection they were supporting 480 people. The agency is registered to provide services for younger adults and older adults with a range of needs including physical disabilities, autism and dementia.

Not everyone who used the service received personal care. CQC only inspects where people receive personal care. This is help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also consider any wider social care provided. At the time of our inspection, 466 people were receiving personal care.

People’s experience of using this service

People and relatives that we spoke with were generally satisfied with the service and many spoke highly of their regular care workers. Most people told us they had continuity of care from caring staff who knew them well and usually arrived as expected.

Risks faced by people were assessed and documented and staff understood how to mitigate them. However, some risk assessments did not contain enough detail and people’s medicines had not always been correctly documented.

People told us they felt safe and they were cared for by staff who were well-trained and understood how to protect them from abuse and report any concerns.

People and their relatives told us that when things went wrong they were comfortable in contacting the office and confident they would be listened to. People who had raised concerns in the past said their concerns had been dealt with appropriately.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

The service had taken steps to address the issues raised at the last inspection, and there had been significant improvements. There was a dedicated quality team and the service was committed to making ongoing improvements.

Staff told us they enjoyed their work and most felt well-supported by the office team.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection:

The last rating for this service was requires improvement (published 25 January 2019).

The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve. At this inspection we found improvements had been made and the provider was no longer in breach of regulations.

Why we inspected

This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service until we return to visit per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.