Aldanat Care

Updated 23 August 2023

The inspection

We carried out this performance review and assessment under Section 46 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act). We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements of the regulations associated with the Act and looked at the quality of the service to provide a rating.

Unlike our standard approach to assessing performance, we did not physically visit the office of the location. This is a new approach we have introduced to reviewing and assessing performance of some care at home providers. Instead of visiting the office location we use technology such as electronic file sharing and video or phone calls to engage with people using the service and staff.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by 2 inspectors.

Service and service type

This service provides care and support to people living in multiple ‘supported living’ settings, so that they can live as independently as possible. People’s care and housing are provided under separate contractual agreements. CQC does not regulate premises used for supported living; this inspection looked at people’s personal care and support.

Registered Manager

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 a short period notice of the inspection because some of the people using it could not consent to a home visit from an inspector. This meant that we had to arrange for a ‘best interests’ decision about this.

Inspection activity started on 15 June 2023 and ended on 13 July 2023. We visited people on 15 June, 16 June and 26 June.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return (PIR). 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 this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We communicated with 7 people who used the service and 7 relatives about their experience of the care provided. Some people who used the service were unable to talk with us, so we used different ways of communicating including using Makaton (a type of sign language), pictures, photos, symbols, objects and their body language. We spoke to 6 professionals who work within the service.

We spoke with 16 members of staff including the registered manager, managers and support workers. We reviewed a range of records. This included 6 people's care records and multiple medication records. We looked at 3 staff files in relation to recruitment and staff supervision. A variety of records relating to the management of the service, including policies and procedures were also reviewed.

Updated 23 August 2023

We expect health and social care providers to guarantee people with a learning disability and autistic people respect, equality, dignity, choices and independence and good access to local communities that most people take for granted. ‘Right support, right care, right culture’ is the guidance CQC follows to make assessments and judgements about services supporting people with a learning disability and autistic people and providers must have regard to it.

About the service

Aldanat Care is a ‘supported living’ service providing personal care for 20 people. Support is primarily provided to people with learning disabilities and autistic people. People live in individual flats and shared houses across Essex. Some people live in the grounds of Peter House, in Manningtree, where there are also offices and training rooms. Not everyone who used the service received personal care. CQC only inspects 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

Right Support

Care plans focused on people's strengths, however in placed needed to develop and build on people's goals and long-term aspirations.

Staff supported people with their medicines when they needed them.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice. However, in some circumstances did not always consider the least restrictive measure.

Staff supported people to play an active role in maintaining their own health and wellbeing and enabled people to access specialist health and social care support in the community.

Right Care

The provider made sure that there was enough skilled staff to meet people's needs and keep them safe, as well as ensuring their met best practice guidance. Staff had training specifically for their role and they felt they were skilled to do their role. People were involved in recruitment. The provider was in the process of developing their training to deliver learning disability and autism and this was something that the provider planned to continue developing.

The service worked well with other agencies to do so. Staff had training on how to recognise and report abuse and they knew how to apply it.

Right Culture

Professionals spoke highly about the responsiveness of staff, however they felt that the communication with the management needed to improve.

Staff felt supported and the management team were always available.

The registered manager had a good understanding of their responsibilities towards people they supported and had passion in delivering person centred care.

The provider had quality assurance systems in place, which ensured they were capturing the good practices as well as where improvements were needed.

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

Rating at last inspection

The last rating for this service was good (published 16 June 2021)

Why we inspected

We received concerns in relation to closed culture and safeguarding risks to people. As a result, we undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of Safe, Effective and Well-led only.

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 remained the same based on the findings of this inspection.

We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at risk of harm from the concerns received. Please see the Safe, Effective and Well-Led sections of this full report.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Aldanat Care 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.