Care Support MK Ltd

Updated 13 May 2023

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. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by 2 inspectors.

Service and service type

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses with family members and in 4 supported living houses where people have their own tenancies.

Immediately following the inspection a notification was been submitted to CQC by the provider so the service type of ‘Supported Living Services’ can be added to their service.

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 were 2 registered managers in post.

Notice of inspection

We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection. This was because it is a small service and we needed to be sure that the provider or registered manager would be in the office to support the inspection.

Inspection activity started on 20 April 2023 and ended on 21 April. We visited the location’s office on 20 April.

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. 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 spoke with 2 people living in their own supported living homes and 3 relatives about their experience of the care provided. We spoke with the nominated individual and both registered managers. The nominated individual is responsible for supervising the management of the service on behalf of the provider. We also spoke with the deputy manager and 4 support workers. We sent an email to 16 staff to request feedback and received 8 responses.

We looked at aspects of 4 people's care records and 2 people’s medication records. We reviewed recruitment records for 2 staff. We looked at a range of other records including quality assurance checks, meeting minutes and training records. We received feedback by email from 2 professionals who worked with the provider and people receiving support.

Updated 13 May 2023

About the service

Care Support MK is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to 7 people the time of the inspection. They specialise in supporting people with a learning disability and autistic people who live at home with family members or in supported living housing. 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.

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.

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

Right Support:

Medicines were administered safely, some areas of medicines recording could be strengthened to reduce the risk of errors. We have made a recommendation to the provider about medicines management. People received safe care and support in their own homes. Staff received training in safeguarding and knew how to protect people from the risk of abuse. Risks to people's safe care and support were assessed and recorded. Staff reported accidents and incidents and these were followed up appropriately and reviewed by the management team. People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives, staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

Right Care:

When people showed behaviour which may indicate distress, staff knew how to offer care and support which reduced the risk of escalation. Positive behaviour support plans gave detailed, personalised guidance to staff on how people expressed their emotions and mood. Staff were recruited safely and people received support from a small team of consistent staff as far as possible.

Right Culture:

Management oversight of the service was effective, improvements to quality assurance processes could strengthen this further. The management team encouraged an open and positive culture and feedback confirmed this. The service was well run and provided high quality, consistent care to people in their own homes. Staff felt respected, supported and valued in their roles. Staff supported people to flourish and achieve good outcomes. Positive feedback was received from professionals who worked with the provider.

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 21 October 2017).

Why we inspected

This inspection was prompted by a review of the information we held about this service.

For those key questions not inspected, we used the ratings awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating.

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