Updated 12 October 2017
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 is 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.
The inspection was carried out by one inspector and an 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 service.
The inspection visit took place on 29 August 2017 and was announced. We gave the provider 48 hours’ notice because the service is a domiciliary care agency and we wanted to make sure that staff would be available at the office to assist us with our inspection. We also wanted to give the provider time to seek agreement from people and their families that we could contact them and obtain their views and experience of the service.
Before the inspection we reviewed the information we held about the service. The provider had completed a Provider Information Return (PIR). This is a form that asks the provider to give key information about the service, what the service does well and the improvements they plan to make. We also reviewed other information we held about the service such as from statutory notifications. A statutory notification is information the service is legally required to send to us about significant events.
On the day of our visit and the following day, we spoke with 11 people and nine relatives of people who used the service.
We spoke with the two owners/providers, one of whom was the registered manager. In the report we refer to the provider and the registered manager. We also spoke with the general manager and 13 staff that included the human resources officer, rota coordinator, helpdesk staff, on call staff and support workers. We received feedback from four external health professionals who had experience of working with the service.
We read the care records for six people and reviewed medicines records. We checked staff recruitment files, rotas, induction, ‘spot checks,’ supervision and training records. We reviewed records relating to the management and monitoring of the service, such as policies and procedures, accident and incident records, quality assurance audits and checks, records of staff meetings and feedback from people using the service and their relatives.