Avenues South Hampshire Services

Avenues South Hampshire Services is supported living service providing personal care to people with a learning disability in their own houses and flats. At the time of the inspection there were 5 people using the service. Some people lived on their own, whilst other people lived in shared accommodation. People received a variable number of support hours per week, depending on their assessed needs.

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 and what we found

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.

Right Support:

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. Care focused on people's abilities and promoted their independence.

Right Care: Staff were respectful of people's dignity, privacy and treated them as individuals with their own beliefs, thoughts, and aspirations.

Right Culture: The provider's management displayed caring and person-centred values. They modelled this behaviour to staff and set expectations that these values should be integral to staff's working practice.

Care enhanced people's lives by helping them to develop their skills and seek opportunities to have useful, fulfilling lives. People were supported to maintain relationships that were important to them, and care was arranged so people could access the services and activities which they wished. People's support plans identified how they would like to be supported and what they would like to achieve with the help of care and support. People's communication needs were identified and met to help ensure they could give meaningful feedback or raise concerns around their care.

People received safe care focused on minimising restrictions related to their care to promote their safety. People were supported to take positive risk to promote their independence whilst still receiving support to help keep them safe. There were enough staff in place, who had received the right training and support in their role.

People were supported to lead healthy lives and access healthcare services when required. Staff had worked with people to overcome their anxieties around accessing community and leisure services. Where appropriate, healthcare professionals were involved in planning and reviewing people's care. Staff were proactive in maintaining these relationships and effective in implementing healthcare professional's advice.

There were effective systems to oversee the quality of the service. There was a registered manager in place supported by service managers who were responsible for organising and overseeing people's care. The registered manager was knowledgeable, approachable, and professional in their role. They had a good understanding of people's needs and how they wished to be supported.

Staff were caring and kind. People and relatives told us that they were happy with the support staff provided. Staff were motivated in their role and understood the principles of promoting people's privacy and dignity by treating them with respect.

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

Rating at last inspection and update

This service was registered with us on 23 June 2022, and this is the first inspection.

Why we inspected

This inspection was prompted by a review of the information we held about this service and in part due to concerns received about poor care and culture. A decision was made for us to inspect and examine those risks.

We found no evidence during this inspection that people were at risk of harm from these concerns. Please see the safe and well-led sections of this full report.

Follow up

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