Archived: Allied Healthcare Brent

Updated 8 June 2014

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 regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and to pilot a new inspection process under Wave 1. This was also our first inspection of this service at its new offices.

The inspection team consisted of an inspector and two experts by experience. We have involved people who use services and family carers to help us improve the way we inspect. We have called them experts by experience because of their unique knowledge and experience of using social care services.

Before our inspection visit, we reviewed the information we held about the service. We asked the provider to complete an information return which we read through. The experts by experience phoned people using services and their representatives before our inspection visit, to ask their views of the service. They spoke with 41 people in total. They reported their findings to the inspector before the inspection visit. We also sent questionnaires to people using the service and care workers, however, we received no replies to these.

We visited the service all day on 13 May 2014 and for the morning of 16 May 2014. This was an announced inspection, which meant the provider was informed two working days beforehand to ensure that key members of the management team would be available in the office. During the visit we spoke with the registered manager and two senior managers along with four staff members based at the office. We also spent time looking at paper and computer records, which included people’s support records, and records relating to the management of the service.

Following our visit we contacted two care workers for their views on the service. We also asked the manager some further questions and reviewed records that the manager gave us during and after the visit.

Updated 8 June 2014

Allied Healthcare Brent provides a domiciliary care service to people in their own homes, particularly older people and people with dementia.  At the time of our visit, the service was providing personal care for approximately 300 people.

We spoke with 37 people using the service, and four relatives, as part of this inspection. Most people spoke highly of the agency and confirmed they would recommend the service to other people. Comments included, “They are really good. They always chat and show that they care when they are with me” and “The carers are ever so caring, I can’t fault them.” People spoke of dignified and individualised care being provided, and a number of people told us of being provided with a consistent team of care workers.

People were involved in making decisions about their care wherever possible. Detailed care plans were set up that reflected people’s individual needs and wishes, and guided staff on the care and support to be provided. Checks were made to ensure that people received punctual care visits that met their needs. People were supported to be independent where appropriate, and people were made to feel that they mattered.

The agency trained staff to help ensure that they had the right skills to meet people’s needs, and supervised established staff on a regular basis. Checks were made to ensure that new staff were of good character before allowing them to work in people’s homes.

People told us they could speak with the agency about any concern and were confident these would be addressed. We found the agency’s complaints systems to be effective.

The agency checked on people’s opinions of the service provided. Results of this were meaningfully used to improve the service that people received, both individually and across the agency.

The agency had an experienced registered manager in post. The provider had effective quality assurance systems to identify service shortfalls and take action to make improvements.

However, we could not be assured of the provider taking reasonable steps to ensure that people received safe care. There were three reasons for this. We were not assured that people were protected from breaches to their human rights, because the agency’s arrangements for obtaining and acting in accordance with the consent of service users or their legal representative were not robust.

We were not assured that the agency’s support of new staff members helped to provide a safe service to people. Some new care workers providing care in people’s homes had not received a timely monitoring visit from senior staff, and we found a case where one such care worker had missed visits to people.

We were also not assured that the agency promptly assessed new people’s needs and set up a plan of care, to help protect new people against the risk of unsafe or inappropriate care. We found recent cases where the assessment took place two to three weeks after care started being provided.

The problems we found breached three health and social care regulations. You can see what action we told the provider to take at the back of the full version of the report.