Advanced Care and Support in the Community

Updated 10 January 2020

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 Care Act 2014.

Inspection team

This consisted of one inspector.

Service and service type

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own homes.

The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.

Notice of inspection

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

Inspection activity started on 28 November 2019 and ended on 30 December 2019. We visited the office location on 28 November 2019.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed the information the CQC held about the service. This included notifications of significant incidents reported to the CQC and the previous inspection report. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return. This is information providers are required to send us with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. This information helps support our inspections.We used all of this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with the registered manager, the care supervisor, and four care workers. We made calls to 18 people and spoke with four people and four relatives. We reviewed a range of records, including six people's care records and medicines records. We looked at four staff files and various records relating to the running of the service, including quality assurance records.

After the inspection

We continued to seek clarification from the provider to validate evidence found. We reviewed policies and procedures. We sought feedback from health and social care professionals.

Updated 10 January 2020

About the service

Advanced Care and Support in the community is a domiciliary care service. It provides care to people living in their own homes. At the time of our inspection they were supporting 58 people. The agency provided services for younger adults and older adults with physical disabilities, sensory impairment and dementia.

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.

People’s experience of using this service

People and their relatives spoke highly of the care workers who visited them and the management of the service. A relative told us, “We had three agencies before, these are by far the best.”

People had continuity of care from staff and a management team who knew them well and were flexible to meet their needs and preferences.

People told us their care workers were usually reliable and arrived on time but if there were any issues then the office would contact them and let them know.

People told us they felt safe and they were cared for by staff who were well-trained and understood how to protect them from abuse. Risks faced by people were assessed and documented and staff understood how to mitigate them.

People and their relatives told us that when things went wrong they were comfortable in contacting the office and confident they would be listened to. People who had raised concerns in the past said their concerns had been dealt with appropriately.

Staff told us they enjoyed their work and felt supported by the management team. Many staff had worked there for many years and they told us that the service had a “friendly” and “family” atmosphere.

Staff were recruited safely. There were robust quality assurance systems in place and the service was working to best practice guidelines and current legislation.

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.

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 23 June 2017).

Why we inspected

This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.

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.