6 July 2022
During an inspection looking at part of the service
About the service
Eco Nights is a respite service providing accommodation and personal care for up six younger people who have a learning disability and/or living with autism. On our first ‘out of hours’ visit the service was supporting two people and at the time of our second ‘out of hours’ visit the service was supporting seven people. One person was undertaking a teatime visit and not staying the night.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
Right Support
• The service recorded when staff restrained people. However, improvements were required to demonstrate staff’s interventions prior to restraint being used and lessons learned to show how staff learned from those incidents and how they might be avoided and reduced.
• The service is a large bungalow which enables people who use the respite service to access the community. The premises is situated within the local community and did not feel unfriendly, intimidating or institutionalised.
• People were able to use communal areas as they wished and to have privacy for themselves if they chose to be alone.
• Each bedroom at Eco Nights was decorated to a specific theme. The provider’s representative stated people had been involved in choosing the theme.
• Staff enabled people to access healthcare provision and services as needed in consultation with their relatives.
• Staff supported people with their medicines.
Right Care
• Staff understood how to protect people from harm and abuse. Where internal investigations were completed, improvements were required to ensure these were robust.
• People received appropriate care that was kind, and which met their needs. However, we were concerned that an agency member of staff used at Eco Nights, did not know the names of two people they supported or the gender of one person. Profiles for people using the service were evident but not for all people being supported on our second ‘out of hours’ visit to Eco Nights. The agency member of staff confirmed they had not read the profiles.
• People’s care and support plans reflected their range of needs. Risks to people were assessed and recorded. Where appropriate, people were supported to take positive risks.
• People who had individual ways of communicating, using body language, sounds, objects of reference and Makaton, could interact with staff.
• The service had enough staff to meet people's needs. Steps were being taken to recruit permanent members of staff so as to reduce reliance on staff from the provider’s ‘sister’ services and staff from external agencies.
Right culture
• The service's quality assurance, monitoring and oversight arrangements required improvement.
• Staff were not aware of the ethos and values of the provider or the principles of 'Right support, Right Care and Right Culture'.
• Despite not all staff having up to date training, people received appropriate care. The provider and their representative told us staff had not received updated training due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
We have made recommendations about safeguarding investigations and the security of COSHH items.
For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk
Rating at last inspection
The last rating for this service was good [published October 2019].
Why we inspected
We undertook this inspection to assess that the service is applying the principles of Right support, right care, right culture.
We looked at infection prevention and control measures under the Safe key question. We look at this in all care home inspections even if no concerns or risks have been identified. This is to provide assurance that the service can respond to COVID-19 and other infection outbreaks effectively.
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.