St Martha's

On this page

• Overview
• Assessing needs
• Delivering evidence-based care and treatment
• How staff, teams and services work together
• Supporting people to live healthier lives
• Monitoring and improving outcomes
• Consent to care and treatment

Effective – this means we looked for evidence that people’s care, treatment and support achieved good outcomes and promoted a good quality of life, based on best available evidence.

This is the first assessment for this service. This key question has not yet been rated.

We have not awarded this service a score for Effective.

Find out about when we will not publish a key question score and what we look at when we assess Effective.

We did not look at Assessing needs during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Effective key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

We did not look at Delivering evidence-based care and treatment during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Effective key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

We did not look at How staff, teams and services work together during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Effective key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

We did not look at Supporting people to live healthier lives during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Effective key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

We did not look at Monitoring and improving outcomes during this assessment. There is no previous rating for the Effective key question so we cannot yet publish a score for this area.

The provider told people about their rights around consent and respected these when delivering person-centred care and treatment.

The provider had established effective processes to ensure people were involved in all decisions about their care so their human and legal rights were upheld. Whenever this was necessary, people’s capacity to make particular decisions were assessed, and involved relevant people and professionals. When needed, staff made referrals to advocacy services and requested an Independent Mental Capacity Advocate (IMCA).

Relatives understood they should be included in discussions about people’s care if they held Lasting Powers of Attorney (LPA). Copies of the LPA documents verifying people had legal representatives to be included in all best interest decision making were not always in place. We discussed this with the provider, they acted immediately and sought to rectify this. We will assess these improvements at our next inspection.

Staff completed training and demonstrated a good understanding and working knowledge of the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS), and the principles of the Mental Capacity Act 2005. The provider had made appropriate DoLS applications and had established an effective monitoring system to maintain clear and accurate records of those individuals under DoLS. Where people's DoLS authorisations contained attached conditions, the provider ensured they were being met.

People had maximum choice and control over their lives, and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems in the service support this practice. When people were assessed as not being able to understand their legal rights, we saw that staff made regular attempts to give people maximum choice in day-to-day life and accessible information to ensure people’s human and legal rights were respected.

One professional told us: “People are treated with respect and offered choices in various aspects of activities or help, if they need any. The care is often subtle, encouraging their independence. I can often see staff just sitting and talking to people, discussing their problems or sharing a joke. People are encouraged to use the garden or go for walks with staff. I believe that their human rights are respected and supported based on the individual needs.”

We saw, and people told us, they were involved in planning their care and making decisions about their day to day lives. We saw staff informing people about their care, giving them choices and seeking their consent.