About the service Blakehill Healthcare (hereafter referred to as Blakehill) is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to people in their own homes. The service provides support to older people and people with physical impairments. At the time of our inspection there were 32 people using the service. 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.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
People were positive about their experiences of using the service, they told us they felt safe and got on well with staff. Comments included, “They are very kind and caring”, and “I feel very safe with my carers they are very good, they are so kind”.
At our last inspection we found a breach of regulation in relation to staff recruitment. At this inspection we found improvements had been made. There was clear evidence of the checks and assessments that had been completed in order to make a robust decision about employment. Some people had support with their medicines, and we saw there was a system in place to document the medicines people received and when they had been administered. Records weren’t always clear in relation to topical cream administration and we have made a recommendation to address this.
Staff felt supported and able to approach senior staff if they had any concerns. Staff had formal supervision sessions when they were able to discuss their support and development needs. They were also subject to spot checks, whereby a senior member of staff attended a care call unannounced. If concerns were ever raised about a member of staff, we saw that these were investigated, and steps taken to support them; for example, by providing extra training if needed.
The service was rated as requires improvement under well led at our last inspection. This improved to good at this inspection. We saw the provider had taken account of our previous findings and taken steps to address them. There was a person centred culture where people and their relatives were a part of care planning and their views and opinions taken in to consideration.
For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at last inspection and update
The last rating for this service was requires improvement (published 25 February 2021). 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
The inspection was prompted in part due to concerns received about staffing and recruitment. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks. For those key questions not inspected, we used the ratings awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating. The overall rating for the service has changed from requires improvement to good based on the findings of this inspection.
We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at risk of harm from this concern.
You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Blakehill on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.