31 January 2020
During a routine inspection
City Care is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care and support to people living in their own homes. 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. At the time of inspection 210 people were receiving personal care.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
People and their relatives were very complementary about the service and the support provided by staff. Relatives told us how much a positive effect the staff had on people. One relative commented, “From [Person’s name]’s point of view, the carers have improved her quality of life. She has more interaction, physically she is better… it means she can stay in her own home, which is where she wants to be. I cannot praise them enough.”
Staff provided care and support to people which made them feel safe. Relatives told us staff were kind and caring with people. Staff knew people well and worked together to provide a continuous level of care. People were treated respectfully by staff.
People were encouraged to remain independent within their own homes. People were supported to access the local community and staff provided social interaction to remove the risk of isolation. Staff provided people with choices about their care and involved relatives with this.
Staff encouraged and supported people to have maximum choice and control of their lives, including supporting people in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.
Medicines continued to be managed safely. Risks to people had been fully assessed and mitigated. Care needs were assessed regularly, and people were consulted and involved in all aspects of their care. Staff continued to be recruited safely
Staff received regular training, supervisions and team meetings. There were enough staff to safely support people. Staff had their competencies checked regularly and were provided with an induction when they joined the service. People (where required) were supported to eat a balanced diet. People were referred and supported to access other healthcare professionals including their GP.
The registered manager and office staff were working on continuously improving the service provided. There were quality assurance systems in place to monitor the quality of care provided to people. This system was being reviewed to make sure all audits of the service were fully effective to drive improvement.
For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at last inspection and update
The last rating for this service was good (published 31 August 2016).
There was also an inspection on 17 January 2019. However, the report following that inspection was withdrawn as there was an issue with some of the information that we gathered.
Why we inspected
This was a planned re-inspection because of the issue highlighted above.
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.