Meridian Health and Social Care - Tamworth

Updated 26 February 2019

Background to this inspection

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:

The inspection was carried out by one inspector and an expert by experience, who made phone calls to people who used the service. An expert by experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service. This expert had experience particularly with services for people with a physical and/ or sensory impairment.

Service and service type: Sevacare Tamworth is a domiciliary care agency, providing care to people in their own homes.

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.

Notice of inspection:

We gave the service 72 hours’ notice of the inspection. This was because we had written to people prior to calling them, so the service could check with people ahead of our visit that they would be happy for us to visit them in their home. We also needed to ensure that a manager was available at the extra care housing site on the day of our visit there.

Inspection site visit activity started on 12 February and ended on 13 February 2019. We spoke to people on the telephone on 11 and 12 February 2019. We visited the extra care and office location on both dates to see the manager and office staff; and to review care records and policies and procedures.

What we did:

Before the inspection

• We reviewed notifications we received from the service in line with their legal obligations.

• We looked at information the provider had sent us about the service in the Provider Information Return (PIR)

• We reviewed CQC surveys from people who used the service.

• We asked the local authority to give us feedback about the service

During the inspection

• We looked at six people’s care records.

• We reviewed records of safeguarding investigations, accidents, incidents and complaints.

• We checked audits and quality assurance reports, as well as recruitment, supervision and training information.

• We spoke with 17 people who used the service and observed interactions between people living at the extra care housing location and their staff.

• We talked to six care staff members, a location manager and the registered manager.

Updated 26 February 2019

About the service:

Sevacare Tamworth is a domiciliary care agency that was providing personal care to 115 people in their own homes and over at the time of the inspection. At the time of inspection, the service cared for people in the wider communities of Tamworth, Burton-on-Trent, Lichfield and Burntwood, as well as at an extra care housing location in Burton-on-Trent.

People’s experience of using this service:

All of the people we spoke with felt safe with the care and support they received from staff. One person summarised this by telling us, “I feel very safe because of the way they treat me with respect and they are caring, they know my limitations. “

People told us the service did not miss any calls and that generally staff were on time, with a few exceptions that had been explained. All of the people we spoke with talked positively about the staff who came to see them and felt they were competent in their role. Apart from a few smaller issues, people we spoke with told us they were satisfied with the care they received and talked positively about the service.

People told us staff were able to meet their needs and were respectful of their individual preferences and diversity. We found that complaints raised had been listened to and investigated by the registered manager. People who used the service and staff told us the registered manager was approachable and helpful.

Some people felt that communication between the service and them could be improved, especially regarding who would come to provide the care. The service was aware that particularly at weekends there needed to be greater consistency of staffing and the registered manager was addressing this.

We found that some record keeping needed to be improved to ensure people’s information was personalised and up to date to inform care. We received positive feedback from the local authority about how the service worked in partnership with them to meet people’s needs.

The service continued to meet the characteristics of Good in most areas. More information is in the full report, which is available on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Rating at the last inspection:

At the last inspection the service was rated Good (9 September 2016). We rated the service as Requires Improvement for ‘Well-led’, which remained at this inspection.

Why we inspected:

This was a planned inspection that was scheduled based on the previous rating. We inspected to check whether the service had sustained its Good rating.

Follow up:

We will continue with our ongoing monitoring of the service.