Home Instead Senior Care

Updated 7 June 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 checked 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 took place on 14 and 15 March 2018 and was announced. The provider was given 48 hours’ notice because we needed to be sure that someone would be in when we visited. We also needed to ensure the manager was available at the office for us to speak to them.

We visited the services office on 15 March 2018 to see the registered manager, staff and to review care records and policies and procedures. The inspection team consisted of two adult social care inspectors.

Before the inspection visit, we reviewed the information we held about the service. We also reviewed information we had received since the last inspection including notifications of incidents the registered manager had sent us.

We spoke with the registered manager, the recruitment and engagement manager, five care workers, two field support officers, a training officer and a HR coordinator. We spoke with four people receiving support in person at their homes.

We visited four people who received support at their homes on 14 March 2018 to ask their opinions of the service and to check their care files.

We telephoned 50 people who received support and were able to speak with 22 people receiving a service to obtain their views. We also spoke with three relatives.

We reviewed a range of records, which included care records for nine people, staff training, support and employment records and other records relating to the management of the domiciliary care agency.

Updated 7 June 2018

Home Instead Senior Care provides personal care and support to people who live in their own homes. The agency has three offices, based in north Sheffield, south Sheffield and Barnsley. The registered manager is based in the north Sheffield office. Support is provided to younger adults and older people living in their own homes in the Sheffield and Barnsley area. Not everyone using Home Instead Senior Care receives the regulated activity, personal care. Care Quality Commission (CQC) only inspects the service being received by people provided with ‘personal care’; which is help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also take into account any wider social care provided. At the time of the inspection Home Instead Senior Care were supporting 59 people with a personal care service.

There was a manager at the service who was registered with the CQC. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the CQC 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 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

At our last inspection, we rated the service good. At this inspection, we found the evidence continued to support the rating of good and there was no evidence or information from our inspection and ongoing monitoring that demonstrated serious risks or concerns. This inspection report is written in a shorter format because our overall rating of the service has not changed since our last inspection.

There were systems in place to protect people from harm, including how medicines were managed. Staff were trained in how to recognise and respond to abuse and understood their responsibility to report any concerns to the management team.

Safe recruitment processes were followed and appropriate checks had been undertaken, which made sure suitable staff were employed to care for people.

People were supported in a kind caring way that took account of their individual needs and preferences. People and their families were supported to express their views and be involved in decisions about their care.

People were supported to have choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems supported this practice.

Staff were supported to provide appropriate care to people because they were trained, supervised and appraised. There was an induction, training and development programme, which supported staff to gain relevant knowledge and skills.

People received regular and ongoing health checks and support to attend appointments. They were supported to eat and drink enough to meet their needs and to make informed choices about what they ate.

The service was responsive to people’s needs and staff listened to what staff said. People could be confident that any concerns or complaints would be listened to and dealt with.

Systems were in place that continuously assessed and monitored the quality of the service.