MiHomecare Hammersmith and Fulham

Updated 16 November 2022

Inspection team

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by two inspectors and two Experts by Experience. An Expert by Experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service.

Service and service type

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own homes and in specialist housing. This provider is required to have a registered manager to oversee the delivery of regulated activities at this location. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Registered managers and providers are legally responsible for how the service is run, for the quality and safety of the care provided and compliance with regulations. At the time of our inspection there was a registered manager in post.

Notice of inspection

We gave the service 2 days’ notice of the inspection. This was because we needed to be sure that certain members of staff would be available to support the inspection.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we held about the service, including records of complaints and incidents the provider is required to tell us about. We spoke with contract monitoring officers at the local authority who commission care from this provider. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return. This is information providers are required to send us annually with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make.

We used all of this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

Inspection activity started on 21 September and ended on 7 October 2022. We visited the location’s office location on 21 September.

We reviewed records of care and support for 25 people and made calls to 27 people who used the service and nine family members. We looked at records of recruitment and induction for 16 staff and spoke with the registered manager, regional manager, regional head of quality and 11 care workers. We reviewed records of electronic call monitoring data for 256 people over a period of one month. We also reviewed records relating to the management of the service, including audits and communications with staff.

Updated 16 November 2022

About the service

MiHomecare Hammersmith and Fulham is a domiciliary care agency. The service provides personal care to older people and people with physical disabilities. At the time of our inspection there were 265 people using the service.

Not everyone who used the service received personal care. In this service, the Care Quality Commission can only inspect the service received by people who get support with personal care. This includes help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where people receive such support, we also consider any wider social care provided.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

People told us they were treated with respect and kindness by the care workers. Most people we spoke with told us that staff arrived on time and stayed for the full duration, however a number of people told us they did not know when staff were due to arrive and were sometimes late. We have made a recommendation about how the service communicates with people who use the service about what they can expect.

People told us the service contacted them to find out their views about the service, but the provider did not always effectively record or respond to feedback. The provider had identified this as an area for development and were due to implement a new system for recording feedback.

Risks to people were assessed with appropriate risk management plans, which conveyed key information about risk to staff. Sometimes risk assessments contained contradictory information which had not been noted in audits. We have made a recommendation about how the provider checks the suitability of risk management plans. Care workers received appropriate training to keep people safe and carry out tasks safely, and people’s feedback confirmed this. People received their medicines at the right times with suitable procedures to ensure this remained the case. People were safeguarded from abuse and poor treatment.

Staff told us they were well supported by managers and received appropriate training and supervision. The service passed information about changes in the branch and learning from incidents to staff. People told us they had found the service responded to concerns raised, but both staff and people using the service sometimes found the office difficult to contact.

For more information, please read the detailed findings section of this report. If you are reading this as a separate summary, the full report can be found on the Care Quality Commission (CQC) website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection and update

The last rating for this service was requires improvement (published 13 November 2020).

At our last inspection we found breaches of the regulations in relation to safe care and treatment and good governance. The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to tell us what they would do and by when to improve.

At this inspection we found improvements had been made and the provider was now meeting these regulations. We have made recommendations about how the provider audits risk management plans We will check whether the provider has acted on these at our next inspection.

Why we inspected

We carried out this inspection to follow up on action we told the provider to take at the last inspection. This inspection was prompted by a review of information we held about the service.

We carried out an announced focused inspection of this service on 8 September 2020 when breaches of legal requirements were found. The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve safe care and treatment and good governance.

We undertook this focused inspection to check they 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 which contain those requirements.

For those key questions not inspected, we used the ratings awarded at the last comprehensive 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 ‘Mihomecare Hammersmith and Fulham’ 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.