Home Instead (Redditch & Bromsgrove)

Home Instead Senior Care (Redditch and Bromsgrove) is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to people in their own homes. The service provides support to younger and older people who may live with dementia, learning disabilities or autistic spectrum disorder, physical disabilities, mental health needs or sensory impairments. At the time of our inspection there were 69 people using the service who received a personal care.

People’s experience of the service and what we found:

We expect health and social care providers to guarantee autistic people and people with a learning disability the choices, dignity, independence and good access to local communities that most people take for granted. Right support, right care, right culture is the statutory guidance which supports CQC to make assessments and judgements about services providing support to people with a learning disability and/or autistic people. We considered this guidance as there were people using the service who have a learning disability and or who are autistic.

Right Care

People told us staff were exceptionally supportive, compassionate and consistently treated them, their families and homes with respect. People were cared for by staff who had developed an in depth knowledge of what mattered to them. Staff use their knowledge of people’s preferences when caring for them, and placed people at the centre of everything they did. People told us this made them feel respected and enhanced their well-being. The provider carefully matched staff to the people they supported. This helped to ensure people’s life experiences and values were celebrated by staff, and people were supported to reconnect with their past and promoted their enjoyment of life. Staff understood how to protect people from poor care and abuse. The service worked well with other agencies to do so. The service had enough appropriately skilled staff to meet people’s needs and keep them safe.

Right Culture

There was a positive and person-centred culture, because of the ethos, values, attitudes and behaviours of the management and staff. People were supported by staff who understood best practice in relation to the wide range of strengths, impairments or sensitivities people with a learning disability and/or autistic people may have. This meant people received compassionate and empowering care that was tailored to their needs. Staff turnover was very low, which supported people to receive consistent care from staff who knew them well. People and those important to them were involved in planning their care. The registered manager and provider regularly checked the quality of people’s care and used their findings to improve the quality of the service and to take learning from incidents.

Right Support

Staff supported people to have choice, independence and maximum control over their lives. Staff focused on people’s strengths and promoted what they could do, so people had a fulfilling and meaningful everyday life. Staff worked with people, relatives and health and social care professionals to maintain people’s health and wellbeing. Staff supported people with their medicines in a way that promoted their independence and achieved the best possible health outcome. Staff supported people to make decisions following best practice in decision-making. Staff communicated with people in ways that met their needs.

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 20/10/2017.

Why we inspected

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

We undertook a focused inspection to review the key questions of safe, caring and well-led only. For those key question 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 Home Instead Senior Care (Redditch and Bromsgrove) 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.

We gave the provider 48 hours’ notice of our intention to undertake an inspection. This was because the organisation provides a domiciliary care service to people in their homes; we needed to be sure that someone would be available at the office.

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats in the community. They have a strong focus on providing tailored care to older and younger adults some of whom were living with a dementia, who may also be living with other conditions. At this inspection we found 51 people were receiving support with personal care.

There was a registered manager for this service. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Registered providers and registered managers 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.

People we spoke with all told us they were receiving quality care from staff that went over and above what they needed to on a regular basis. Everyone we spoke with said they would recommend the service. People also told us all staff were caring, knowledgeable and compassionate, and they spoke with a sense of fondness when describing staff. People and staff had formed caring relationships with each other. Relatives informed us the staff showed a high level of understanding towards their family members. People told us the support they received improved their well-being and enabled them to live the way they chose to in their own home. Staff showed a sense of ownership for the quality of care provided.

The management team focussed on feedback from people, their relatives and staff as an integral part of their quality assurance system. This was achieved through annual surveys, meetings with people, complaints, and reviews. We saw action was taken and improvements were made to improve the quality of service provided which impacted positively on people’s lives. The management team monitored and audited the quality of care provided, and used this information to for continuous improvement. People, their relatives and staff spoke highly of the management team. Staff told us effective leadership had a positive impact on staff morale. The management team maintained links with the community to share knowledge and keep their practice updated.

People we spoke with told us they were confident with the staff who supported them. Staff we spoke with recognised the different types of abuse and there were systems in place to guide them in reporting any concerns. Staff were knowledgeable about how to manage people’s individual risks. People were supported to receive their medicines by trained staff who knew the risks associated with them.

People benefited from staff who had up to date knowledge and training. Staff told us they shared best practice to ensure they had the skills to meet people’s needs. Staff always ensured people gave their consent to the support they received. People we spoke with said they were supported to make their own decisions and felt listened to by staff. Staff had clear guidance about what support people needed with decisions and who needed to be involved. People were supported to eat and drink well when this was part of their identified needs. People and their relatives told us staff supported them to access health professionals when they needed to. The management team had links with services available in the community. People told us there was good communication between themselves, staff and health and welfare professionals.

People we spoke with and their relatives told us their support was adaptable to meet their needs. The management team demonstrated they understood their responsibility to provide a service that was flexible to people’s changing needs. They ensured there were sufficient staff with the required skills to meet people’s needs. People told us their needs were more than met; they said the service exceeded their expectations. People and their relatives knew how to raise complaints and the management team had arrangements in place to ensure people were listened to and appropriate action taken.