Charlotte House

Updated 8 August 2019

The inspection

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.

The inspection team

The inspection was carried out by one inspector.

Service and service type

Charlotte House is a 'care home'. People in care homes receive accommodation and nursing or personal care as single package under one contractual agreement. CQC regulates both the premises and the care provided, and both were looked at during this inspection.

The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.

Notice of inspection

Due to the nature of the service, we informed the provider of our inspection plan. This is because the provider operates a number of care homes as well as the domiciliary care service using one large staff team. For Charlotte House, inspection activity started on 14 May 2019 and ended on 01 July 2019. We visited the office location on 08 May 2019.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed all the information we held about the provider and spoke with the commissioning authority. We reviewed the notifications sent to us from the provider in line with their legal responsibility. We did not ask the provider to complete a PIR.

During the inspection

During the inspection, we visited the office, we looked at one person’s care records and checked records relating staff administration of medicines and training. We checked audits and quality assurance reports, incident and accident records, as well as the recruitment supervision and training information for nine staff, as staff work across all U&I Care Limited services. We visited the care home on 14 May 2019 and met with the person living there we also spoke with a family member.

We spoke at length with 22 members of staff who work across all U&I Care Limited services including, support workers, senior staff, the service manager, the registered manager, a director, human resources and the behaviour support psychologist.

Updated 8 August 2019

Charlotte House is a 'care home'. It provides services for adults with a learning disability and autism, Charlotte house is registered to provide support for two adults and at the time of the inspection one person lived in the home.

The service has been developed and designed in line with the principles and values that underpin Registering the Right Support and other best practice guidance. This ensures that people who use the service can live as full a life as possible and achieve the best possible outcomes. The principles reflect the need for people with learning disabilities and/or autism to live meaningful lives that include control, choice, and independence. People using the service receive planned and co-ordinated person-centred support that is appropriate and inclusive for them.

People’s experience of using this service and what we found

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 this practice.

The service applied the principles and values of Registering the Right Support and other best practice guidance. These ensure that people who use the service can live as full a life as possible and achieve the best possible outcomes that include control, choice and independence.

The outcomes for people using the service reflected the principles and values of Registering the Right Support by promoting choice and control, independence and inclusion. People's support focused on them having as many opportunities as possible for them to gain new skills and become more independent.

Care and support was delivered on an individual basis and the occupant of the home decided the daily routines. Care, support and activities were planned around individual likes and dislikes. People were encouraged to participate in activities that were meaningful to them for example charity work and to experience new activities with varying degrees of success due to people’s general dislike of change.

The person being supported told us that they had opportunities to connect with other people using the U&I Care Limited services with attendance at social clubs, discos, and dinner clubs but often preferred not to go. They told us of connections they had made with the wider community.

We were told that relatives had concerns around the level of activities their relative attended and that they should be “made” to do things. We discussed with the manager ways to improve people’s understanding of how individuals are supported with choice. This aspect of people’s care across all U&I Care services needs to be reviewed, to be able to manage families expectations in line with legislation as people transitioned from children’s service and receive support in adult services.

The person told us that they felt safe with the support from staff, they told us that the manager had arranged for staff to support them with whom they got on best. The service worked very hard to promote inclusivity and people’s diversity was embraced. Staff demonstrated this with their knowledge of how people communicated, made their needs and wishes known, and what worked best to ensure they had a good day.

Staff told us that they were proud to work for U&I Care Limited and we saw there was a genuine affection for the people they supported. There were processes in place for staff to access support at any time and we were told by staff that they felt supported by the management team. Records clearly showed that staff also received formal supervision, appraisal and regular training.

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)

The last rating for this service was requires improvement (published 02 May 2018) and there were two breaches of regulation. The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when to improve. At this inspection we found improvements had been made and the provider was no longer in breach of regulations.

Why we inspected

This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.

Follow up

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service until we return to visit as per our re-inspection programme. If we receive any concerning information we may inspect sooner.