Archived: Your Life Care and Support

The service had not previously been inspected.

The service provides personal care to people in their own homes. This includes providing support to a group of people with learning difficulties in their own flats where they can live independently overnight, providing 24 hour support to people living on their own and support to people who require daily support through regular visits by staff to their homes. The service at the time of our inspection provided support to 17 people.

There was a registered manager in post. 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. At this service, the registered manager and the registered provider are the same person.

We found staff underwent a number of checks before they were allowed to start working in the service so that people were protected against the risk of unsuitable people caring for them.

Risks in the service and to individual people had been identified and actions put in place to mitigate risks. Staff had been allocated responsibility to ensure the risks were managed and up to date.

The registered provider maintained a record of accidents and reviewed the accidents to look for patterns or trends where action could be taken to prevent a re-occurrence.

People had been assessed to check if they were able to administer their own medicines. Plans had been put in place to ensure people were given the required support to take their medicines according to their individual needs.

We found staff knew about people’s backgrounds and were familiar with their likes and dislikes. They enabled people to participate in the inspection, for example they explained to people what the inspector was doing whilst asking other people if they would like to speak to us.

We found choice was a key component of the service. Staff interacted with people in a manner that gave people choices and proactively looked for choices for people.

The service had responded to the needs and wishes of people in relation to their preferred activities. We saw the staff rota had been arranged so staff could accommodate people’s outings. This meant the registered provider put the needs of people first and their needs were being met by a registered provider who saw them as the priority.

The registered provider had introduced a quarterly review so people were involved to review the positive aspects of their lives and the things they had achieved. People showed us they were happy about these reviews.

We saw the registered manager had offered and provided support to improve people’s living conditions to offer more independence by going the extra mile and applying for grants.

The registered manager was aware of national initiatives to improve services and had reviewed the service in line with the initiatives. They demonstrated the service was meeting the initiatives and wanted to continuously improve the service.

The registered manager attended the local disability forum where local initiatives had been discussed. These had been passed onto the service staff and included to improve the service.

We found the service had conducted a quality audit and the registered manager had responded to the feedback. People were able to tell us how the registered manager had responded to the feedback.

We found people's needs were assessed and care and treatment was planned and delivered in line with their individual care plan.

People said they were happy with the care and support they received from Your Life Care and Support. One person told us "I love it here. I've settled in.' It was clear from the enthusiasm other people showed when they spoke with us about the support provided to them, they were happy with the services provided.

People were protected from the risk of infection because appropriate guidance had been followed. We saw the provider had an infection control policy in place and saw evidence to confirm staff had completed infection control training. The people we spoke with said the care staff took precautions to prevent the spread of infection when they provided care to them.

People said they were happy with the staff employed by the service and the support they provided. People also said the staff knew them well and how to help and support them in their everyday life. Comments from people we spoke with about the staff included 'They are fab, they are nice' and 'The stuff the staff have taught me is good.'

People who used the service and their representatives were asked for their views about their care and they were acted upon.

People told us they were happy with the service and knew how to contact the registered manager or staff if they had any concerns. One person told us 'I know who to call straight away' should they need any support or reassurance.