Caremark Cannock Chase and South Staffordshire

Updated 5 October 2018

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

This inspection visit took place on the 11 and 13 September 2018 and was announced. We gave the provider 24 hours notice of the inspection site visits. This was because the manager and staff is often out of the office providing care and we needed to be sure that they would be available. The inspection visit was carried out by two inspectors and an expert by experience. The expert by experience had knowledge of care services including domiciliary services. The Inspection site visit activity was carried out on 13 September 2018, it included making telephone calls to people and relatives. We visited the office location on 11 September 2018 to see the registered manager and office staff; and to review care records and policies and procedures.

We checked the information we held about the service and the provider. This included notifications that the provider had sent to us about incidents at the service and information that we had received from the public. A notification is information about events that by law the registered persons should tell us about. We brought forward our planned comprehensive inspection of this service due to the concerns we were receiving. We used information the provider sent us in the Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We used this information to formulate our inspection plan.

At the inspection we gave the provider the opportunity to send us further information relating to capacity and consent. We asked for this information to be provided on Friday 14 September 2018. The provider sent us this information and we considered this as part of our inspection.

We used a range of different methods to help us understand people's experiences. We made telephone calls to five people who used the service and four relatives. We spoke with two members of care staff, the registered manager and two office staff. We also spoke with the provider who was available during our inspection. During the office visit we looked at the care records for ten people. We checked that the care they received matched the information in their records. We also looked at records relating to the management of the service, including, rotas complaints and policies.

Updated 5 October 2018

This comprehensive inspection took place on the 11 and 13 September 2018 and was announced. This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own homes. It provides a service to adults. At the time of our inspection the provider was supporting 54 people.

At our last inspection the provider was rated as requires improvements and were in breach of regulations. At this inspection the provider has improved to good.

There is a registered manager in post. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they 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 were safe and risks, including environmental had been considered and reviewed. There were systems in place to ensure medicines were managed in a safe way. There were enough staff available to support people and the provider had ensured they had received an induction and relevant training. Staff understood when people may be at risk of harm and there were procedures in place for this. We found there were also infection control procedure in place and these were followed including the use of gloves and aprons whilst supporting people.

People were supported consistently in a kind and caring way by staff they were happy with. People’s independence was promoted and they were encouraged to make choices. We found people’s privacy and dignity was promoted. There was a complaints procedure in place and this was followed when needed, when complaints had been made these had been responded to in line with this procedure and people were happy with the outcome.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems in the service support this practice. We found when needed there were capacity and best interest decisions in place. The service worked jointly with health professionals when needed and people had access to health professionals. When needed people were supported to purse their hobbies and interests and with eating and drinking.

There were systems in place to monitor the quality of the service and this information was used to drive improvements. When things had gone wrong within the service the provider and manager used this information so lessons could be learnt and improvements made. We were being notified of significant events that had occurred and the provider was displaying their rating in line with our requirements. Staff felt supported and listened to people were happy with the care and support they received.