Rainbow Trust Children's Charity 3

Rainbow Trust Children’s Charity 3 provides support to families who have children or young people with a life limiting or terminal illness. Support is provided to individual families, parents, children and young people. Not everyone using Rainbow Trust Children's Charity 3 receives a regulated activity; the Care Quality Commission (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 and support provided. At the time of our inspection there were five children receiving support with personal care, when needed.

Since our last inspection two Rainbow Trust Charity teams had merged to form one large team, which covered the areas of Cumbria, Greater Manchester and Lancashire.

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

Without exception people spoke highly of the service, its staff and management. People told us the help they received was invaluable as staff supported them through the difficult times of caring for a very sick child. People told us the service was extremely responsive. Staff took the lead from parents and helped in ways that were appropriate and beneficial for each particular family.

Staff told us they loved their job and were proud to work for the charity. They said they felt listened to, appreciated and supported by an organisation who cared for them and their wellbeing. There was a positive workplace culture, as the organisation valued, encouraged and praised its staff.

The registered manager was committed to employing people who shared the caring values of the organisation and safe recruitment practices were followed. All staff received safeguarding training and demonstrated their understanding of the action they should take if they suspected abuse or neglect.

Families were supported safely, and risks were assessed appropriately. Staff took measures to prevent and control the spread of infection.

Staff were well trained and had the support and supervision they needed to work in emotionally challenging roles.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice. The service respected and promoted children’s rights and ensured they were given a voice and their opinions were listened to and acted upon.

The service worked in close partnership with other organisations to ensure families were provided with exceptionally responsive, person-centred support.

The registered manager was held in high regard by staff and families and was committed to maintaining the very high standards of the service. They had clear oversight of the team and monitored the quality of support and care provided by the staff.

The registered manager had overseen the merger of local teams to create one large team. This had provided greater opportunities for sibling support, for increasing the number of families referred to the service and for sharing best practice with staff.

Rating at last inspection:

The last rating for this service was outstanding (published 7 December 2016).

Why we inspected:

This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.

Follow up:

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

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

The Rainbow Trust provides support to families who have children or young people with a life limiting or terminal illness. Support is provided to individual families, parents, children and young people. It also offers parents and children to come together in groups for support, to provide support to other parents or commemorate children who have passed away.

The service had a registered manager who had been in post. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

Without any exceptions family members and professionals who referred people to the service highly praised the registered manager and the staff.

The service was exceptionally responsive. We saw the service had been developed to meet a variety of family needs. Funding had been successfully sought to provide sibling support. The feedback from children and young people indicated they highly valued the support on an individual level and in group activities. The parents we spoke to repeatedly told us about the high levels of response from staff if they felt they needed support. They told us staff responded quickly to visit them and the support of the staff strengthened their coping abilities. They also spoke very highly of the practical support offered to them.

We found the culture of the organisation to be caring. Staff were provided with support through supervision meetings to allow them to reflect on their work and come to terms with family bereavement. Staff were then able to provide a consistent quality care as described by family members when they spoke to us. Parents spoke to us about the way staff supported them by being caring and meeting their family’s needs.

Rainbow Trust 3 demonstrated they promoted children's rights as prescribed in the UN Convention of the Rights of Child. Children were given a strong voice in the project to influence their service and were also given different ways to express their voice either through play, art or talking with their allocated workers.

Children and young people were supported to give their feedback which in turn influenced the service. Participation of parents through the “Parent Voices Count” group further ensured the service learnt from people’s experiences to inform and advise the service on how to improve.

The service had in place risk assessments which protected children from harm when they were working with families. Staff had been trained in safeguarding children and young people. They told us they felt confident to discuss any of their worries about families with the registered manager.

We saw the registered provider had put in place robust recruitment procedures to ensure that staff were not only safe to work with families going through very stressful periods but also had knowledge skills and values required by the service.

During their induction period staff were provided with opportunities to learn about the service including meeting other staff from agencies with whom the service had strong partnerships working in place. Staff received training in line with their role and told us the Rainbow Trust supported their professional development.

The registered manager provided clear direction to the staff and led the service in line with the registered provider’s business plan.

The service had contacted a local Islamic trust to enable them to reach more people from the local communities.

Most of the children and young people supported by the service were under the age of 16 and therefore the Mental Capacity Act did not apply to them. However we found the service used best practice principles and gave children and young people a choice based on their maturity and ability to weigh up advantages and disadvantages.

The service was continually monitored by the registered manager and the registered provider had in place a “Snapshot Day” where everyone who comes into contact with the service on the day is asked for their feedback. We saw the feedback on the day was overwhelmingly positive.