Priority Home Care

Updated 9 April 2019

The inspection:

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team:

This inspection was completed by a single inspector.

Service and service type:

Priority Home Care is a domiciliary care agency. This service provides care and support to people living in their own homes.

Not everyone using Priority Home Care received a regulated activity; CQC only inspects the service being received by people provided with ‘personal care’; help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also take into account any wider social care provided.

The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.

Inspection site visit activity started on 12 March 2019 and ended on 14 March 2019. We visited the office location on the morning of 12 March 2019 and people in their homes in the afternoon. We returned to the office all day on 14 March 2019 to see the manager and office staff; and to review care records and policies and procedures.

Notice of inspection:

We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection visit so that people could be informed of our visit and permissions could be sought to arrange home visits.

What we did:

We reviewed information we had received about the service. This included details about incidents the provider must notify us about, such as abuse; and we sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service.

We visited five people’s homes and spoke with four people who used the service. We met with three relatives. We received feedback from two health and social care professionals via telephone.

We spoke with the registered manager and nominated individual. A Nominated Individual has overall responsibility for supervising the management of the service, and ensuring the quality of the services provided. We met with two carers and two senior carers. We reviewed four people’s care files, four Medicine Administration Records (MAR), policies, risk assessments, health and safety records, incident reporting, consent to care and treatment and quality audits. We looked at three staff files, the recruitment process, complaints, and training and supervision records.

Updated 9 April 2019

About the service:

Priority Home Care is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats. It provides a service to older adults. At the time of our inspection there were 29 people receiving personal care from the service.

Rating at last inspection:

There have not been any published ratings inspections against this location.

Why we inspected:

This inspection was a scheduled inspection.

People’s experience of using this service:

People and their families described the staff as caring, kind and friendly. People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

People and relatives told us they were happy with the service, and that staff had a good understanding of their needs and preferences. People were protected from avoidable harm as staff understood how to recognise signs of abuse and the actions needed if abuse was suspected. There were enough staff to provide safe care and recruitment checks had ensured they were suitable to work with vulnerable adults.

When people were at risk of falling or skin damage staff understood the actions needed to minimise avoidable harm. The service was responsive when things went wrong and reviewed practices in a timely manner. Medicines were administered and managed safely by trained staff.

The service had an open and positive culture that encouraged involvement of people, their families, staff and other professional organisations. Leadership was visible and promoted teamwork. People, professional’s and relatives spoke highly about the management and staff had a clear understanding of their roles and responsibilities.

Checks of safety and quality were made to ensure people were protected. Work to continuously improve was noted and the registered manager was keen to make changes that would impact positively on people's lives.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

A full description of our findings can be found in the sections below.

Follow up:

We will continue to monitor intelligence we receive about the service until we return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If any concerning information is received we may inspect sooner.