Background to this inspection
Updated
30 June 2018
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 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 Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.
This unannounced inspection was carried out on 11, 12 and 13 April 2018 by one social care inspector and an assistant inspector.
Before our inspection we reviewed the information we held about the service. This included the statutory notifications sent to us by the provider about incidents and events that had occurred at the service. A notification is information about important events which the service is required to send to us by law. We also contacted the local authority to gather their feedback about the service.
During the inspection we spent time at the service’s office and we visited some of the people being supported at their homes. We spoke with nine people who were supported by the service and five of their relatives. We spoke with 11 members of staff who held different roles within the service. This included the Director of Operations and the registered manager.
We looked at a range of documentation including eight people’s care records, medication records, five staff recruitment and personnel files, staff training records, accident and incident information, health and safety records, safeguarding and complaints records, audits, policies and procedures and records relating to the quality checks undertaken by staff and other management records.
Updated
30 June 2018
This unannounced inspection was carried out on 11, 12 and 13 April 2018 by one social care inspector and an assistant inspector. The first two days of the inspection were spent at the service’s office and visiting some of the people supported by the service. On the third day of the inspection we contacted more of the people supported by the service by telephone.
Crossroads Care Liverpool Knowsley Sefton & Warrington provides care and support to adults and children in their own homes. The service also provides a STARS (Support, Talk, Act, Review, Share) service for end of life care in partnership with Marie Curie and Homecarers Liverpool Limited. At the time of our inspection the service was providing support for 59 people and employed 34 staff.
At our last inspection in November 2016 we rated the service as good. At this inspection we found the evidence continued to support the rating of good and there was no evidence or information from our inspection and ongoing monitoring that demonstrated serious risks or concerns. This inspection report is written in a shorter format because our overall rating of the service has not changed since our last inspection.
The service had a registered manager. 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.
The service had clear and effective policies and procedures to safeguard people from abuse. All staff we spoke with were able to tell us what they would do in these circumstances and they had confidence in both their own and management’s ability to deal with any issues.
We saw that staff were recruited safely following a thorough recruitment process. This process included carrying out the relevant checks, known as Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks, to ensure staff were safe to work with vulnerable people.
Medication was stored, administered and recorded safely and people told us they received their medicines on time and with the support they needed. Staff responsible for the administration of medicines had received training to ensure they had the competency and skills required.
Staff were well-supported with regular and structured supervision and appraisal meetings. All new staff were supported to complete the Care Certificate as part of their induction and we saw that staff were up-to-date with the training they needed to support people safely and effectively. This included specialist training where necessary, such as stoma care, suctioning and tracheotomy care.
People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive ways possible; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.
All of the people we spoke with told us that the staff were kind, caring and treated them with respect.
The care plans we reviewed were person-centred, detailed, regularly reviewed and contained appropriate risk assessments to help keep people safe and give staff the information they needed to effectively manage any risks.
We saw that the service used various methods to assess and monitor the quality of the service it was providing. These included regular audits, spot checks of staff performance and regular staff meetings to share learning points and gather feedback from staff.
Further information is in the detailed findings below.