Archived: Care Organiser

Updated 8 December 2015

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.

We undertook an unannounced focused inspection of Care Organiser on 26 October 2015. This inspection was completed to check that improvements had been made to meet legal requirements after our comprehensive inspection on 23 and 24 June 2015. We inspected the service against one of the five questions we ask about services namely is the service safe. This was because the service was not meeting legal requirements in relation to this question.

Before our inspection we reviewed the information we held about the home, this included the provider’s action plan, which set out the action they would take to meet legal requirements.

During our visit to the service we spoke with two people who lived there, two members of staff and the manager of the supported living unit we visited. We looked at three people’s care records including records relating to people’s medicines. After our inspection we received information from the registered manager concerning staff training and competency checks.

Updated 8 December 2015

We carried out a comprehensive inspection of this service on 23 and 24 June 2015. A breach of a legal requirement was found. This was because although peoples medicine was stored safely, and people received their medicines as prescribed, sometimes it was not clear from records what ‘as required’ medicine people should have and out of date medicines were not always disposed of in a timely manner.

After the comprehensive inspection, the provider wrote to us to say what they would do to meet legal requirements in relation to the breach.

During our last comprehensive inspection we saw that some strong cleaning chemicals were stored in people’s flats. We were concerned that some of the people who used the service may not be safe as these strong cleaning chemicals were easily accessible to them and there were periods during the day when people were left unsupervised in their own homes.

We undertook a focused inspection on the 26 October 2015 to check that the procedures for recording, storing and disposal of peoples medicine’s had been reviewed by staff and to confirm that they had followed their plan to meet legal requirements. We also reviewed the systems in place to risk assess the cleaning chemicals in people’s homes within the supported living service.

This report only covers our findings in relation to this topic. You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the 'all reports' link for ‘Care Organiser’ on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

Care Organiser provides personal care for people who live in supported living accommodation. The people who use the service have a range of needs including learning disabilities some requiring 24 hour support. During our inspection in June 2015, 42 people were using the service accommodated by nine separate supported living units.

The service had 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.

During our focused inspections on the 26 October 2015, we found that the provider had followed their plan and legal requirements had been met.

There were improvements to how changes in people’s medicine were recorded audited and the way people’s medicine was disposed of when no longer required. The provider was planning to put a formal competency assessment in place to regularly monitor staff knowledge in medicine administration to ensure people received their medicine safely.

Locks had been placed on storage cupboards in people’s rooms to keep them safe from potentially dangerous cleaning chemicals. The manager had started to risk assess which product would be safe for some people to use independently and had started to put procedures in place for staff to follow. Formal risk assessments regarding people’s use of cleaning chemicals in their own homes had not been carried out. We will look at how the service keeps people safe in their own homes during our next comprehensive inspection.