21 April 2022
During an inspection looking at part of the service
Virtus Care LTD is a domiciliary care agency. At the time of the inspection, the service was providing support to five people. CQC only inspects services 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
During this inspection we found the service had made improvements around the management of risks and quality assurance.
People told us they felt safe and trusted the staff providing care and support. People received help and support from a consistent and professional staff team.
People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and the provider supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the application of the policies and systems supported good practice.
The provider assessed the risks associated with people’s care and support needs and staff members were knowledgeable about these risks and knew what to do to minimise any potential for harm.
Risk assessments were reviewed when changes to people's health occurred and the provider worked in partnership with other health and social care professionals to optimise people's health, care and well-being.
People received safe support with their medicines by staff members who had been trained and assessed as competent to provide this support where it formed part of an agreed package of care.
Staff followed effective infection prevention and control procedures and had access to personal protective equipment (PPE).
Safe recruitment processes were being followed to ensure staff were suitable for their roles.
The provider operated effective quality monitoring systems and sought feedback from people using the service, family members, staff and healthcare professionals in order to continually improve standards of care.
The provider had policies and procedures in place including an appropriate complaints procedure.
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 (27 August 2019). At the time, we found a breach of regulation 12 (Safe care and treatment) and made a recommendation in relation to the development and implementation of robust quality assurance systems. At this inspection we found improvements had been made and the provider was no longer in breach of regulations.
Why we inspected
We carried out an announced focused inspection of this service on 21 April 2022 to check the provider had followed their action plan and to confirm they now met legal requirements. This report only covers our findings in relation to the Key Questions Safe and Well-led.
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. This is based on the findings at this inspection.
You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the 'all reports' link for Virtus Care LTD on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.
Follow up
We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.