Updated 18 October 2019
The inspection
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. We checked whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act. We looked at the overall quality of the service and provided a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.
Inspection team
This consisted of two inspectors.
Service and service type
Elmgrove House provides care and support to people living in specialist ‘extra care’ housing. Extra care housing is purpose-built or adapted single household accommodation in a shared site or building. The accommodation is rented and is the occupant’s own home. People’s care and housing are provided under separate contractual agreements. CQC does not regulate premises used for extra care housing; this inspection looked at people’s personal care and support service.
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
This inspection was unannounced. The provider knew we would be returning on the second day of the inspection.
What we did before the inspection
We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. This included any significant incidents that occurred at the service. The provider was not asked to complete a provider information return prior to this inspection. This is information we require providers to send us to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make. We took this into account when we inspected the service and made the judgements in this report. We also reviewed the last inspection report. We used all of this information to plan our inspection.
During the inspection
We met all 12 people who used the service during the inspection and spoke with four of them. As some people were not fully able to communicate with us, we carried out observations throughout the inspection to help us understand the experiences of people who could not talk with us in more detail.
We spoke with eight members of staff. This included the registered manager, the care and support compliance manager and the nominated individual. The nominated individual is responsible for supervising the management of the service on behalf of the provider. We also spoke with the support officer care coordinator, the health and safety officer and three domiciliary care officers.
We also spoke with two relatives who were visiting during the inspection.
We reviewed a range of records. This included four people’s care and medicines records and three staff files in relation to recruitment, training and supervision. We reviewed records related to the management of the service, which included incident reports, quality assurance checks and minutes of team and tenant meetings. We also sat in on an afternoon handover meeting with the registered manager and four domiciliary care officers.
After the inspection
We contacted two more relatives of people who used the service and spoke with one of them. We also had correspondence with one health and social care professional who had experience of working with the service.