About the service Triple Home Care Ltd is a domiciliary (home care) care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats. 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 our inspection there were 27 people receiving the regulated activity of personal care.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
People were supported to be safe by staff who demonstrated good infection prevention and control (IPC) practises. Staff wore personal protective equipment, used it safely, and disposed of it safely.
Checks were in place including for staff temperatures and wellbeing and also to help ensure staff put their IPC and hygiene training into practise. One person told us, “I feel so safe when staff put their protective masks, gloves and aprons on; I know it is for my safety.” The provider’s electronic care visit monitoring systems were useful in alerting them on staff’s usage of PPE and if this was as expected.
Staff were supported in their role with effective training. This was for subjects appropriate to people's care needs including, medicines administration, moving and handling, safeguarding as well as specific health conditions. One relative said, “The staff have amazing skills. They really do know how to care for my [family member]. We have used other care companies and Triple Home Care are by far the best.”
Due to restrictions imposed as a result of the pandemic, the registered manager used video technology to train staff in practical ways such as the use of PPE to increase staff competence. A staff member told us, “I have never worked in care before but the support has given me the skills and confidence I needed.”
Rating at last inspection
The last rating for this service was Good, (published 20 September 2019).
Why we inspected
The inspection was prompted in response to concerns about IPC practises, staff training and support to staff. This was about specific concerns we had been made aware of which indicated a risk to people’s safety. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks. We wrote to the provider and asked for information around their systems and processes. This included policies and the care needs of people who used the service.
CQC have introduced targeted inspections to follow up on Warning Notices or to check specific concerns. They do not look at an entire key question, only the part of the key question we are specifically concerned about. Targeted inspections do not change the rating from the previous inspection. This is because they do not assess all areas of a key question.
We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at risk of harm from these concerns. Please see the safe and effective sections of this report.
You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Triple Home Care Ltd on our website at www.cqc.org.uk
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.