Authum Care Ltd

Authum Care Ltd is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to people in their own homes. At the time of our inspection there were 9 people using the service.

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.

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

Staff had not always been recruited safely; we have made a recommendation relating to this.

The service had enough staff. People were supported with their medicines as prescribed. There were systems and processes to safeguard people from the risk of abuse.

People’s care plans and risk assessments provided staff with guidance to support people safely and meet their individual needs.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice. However, we found capacity assessments did not include the specific decisions being made; we have made a recommendation regarding this.

Staff received an induction and training to enable them to meet people’s needs in line with their preferences. However, they did not have clear guidance relating to first aid. We have made a recommendation relating to this.

Staff provided care and support respectfully whilst promoting people’s independence. People were involved in their care arrangements and able to make decisions about how care was provided.

Staff communicated with people in ways they could understand.

The registered manager had processes to monitor the quality of the service. This included audits and staff spot checks and competency assessments.

We found room for improvement in recording of incidents and the registered manager took action to address this.

People’s relatives spoke positively about the management of the service and staff felt supported by the registered manager.

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.

At the time of the inspection, the location did not care or support for anyone with a learning disability or an autistic person.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk

Rating at last inspection

This service was registered with us on 27 January 2023 and this is the first inspection.

Why we inspected

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

Recommendations

We have made recommendations in relation to staff recruitment, mental capacity assessments and first aid guidance at this inspection.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.