Archived: Brent Supported Living

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 Care Quality Commission (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.

About the service

Brent Supported Living is registered to provide personal care. At the time of this inspection, the service was providing personal care for five people living in a supported living scheme. People who used the service had profound and multiple learning disabilities (PMLD). PMLD is when a person has a severe learning disability and other disabilities that significantly affect their ability to communicate and to be independent. Someone with PMLD may have severe difficulties when seeing, hearing, speaking and moving. They may need assistance with transferring as they cannot weight bear or mobilise and likely to be in a specialised wheelchair and may require support with feeding.

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

The service demonstrated how they were meeting the underpinning principles of Right support, right care, right culture.

Right support:

Staff were aware of and followed best practice and the principles of Right support. People received person centred support and their needs were met. Staff focused on people’s strengths and promoted what they could do, so people had a fulfilling and meaningful life. People were enabled to access specialist health. This was confirmed by relatives. The service provided care and support in a safe, clean, well equipped, well-furnished and well-maintained environment that met their sensory and physical needs. The service people received was provided in a house, which was similar to the other houses in the area. People’s rooms were clean and personalised with their belongings and family photographs.

Right care:

The service had enough appropriately skilled staff to meet people’s needs and keep them safe. We observed people who had individual ways of communicating, using body language, sounds and pictures. People could interact comfortably with staff and others involved in their care and support because staff had the necessary skills to understand them. People could take part in activities and pursue interests that were tailored to them. The service gave people opportunities to try new activities that enhanced and enriched their lives. A relative told us, “My [relative] has visited places in London I have never visited yet.” Some people had won awards in a range of competitions offered locally or by the provider, Achieve Together. Staff spoke knowledgeably about how they ensured people received care that met their diverse needs, including spiritual and cultural differences.

Right culture:

The ethos, values, attitudes and behaviours of leaders and care staff ensured people using services led confident, inclusive and empowered lives. Leaders had the skills, knowledge and experience to perform their roles and had a clear understanding of people’s needs and oversight of the services they managed. This was demonstrated by the registered manager and the regional manager throughout the inspection. They were both visible in the service, approachable and took a genuine interest in people. Staff told us they felt valued.

There were effective systems and processes in place to minimise risks to people. The assessments provided information about how to support people to ensure risks were reduced.

There were enough care workers deployed to keep people safe. Pre-employment checks had been carried out.

There were systems in place to ensure proper and safe use of medicines. We observed from records people received their medicines on time.

People were protected from the risks associated with poor infection control because the service had processes in place to reduce the risk of infection and cross contamination.

There was a process in place to report, monitor and learn from accidents and incidents. Accidents were documented timely in line with the service’s policy and guidance.

There was an effective training system in place. Care workers demonstrated good knowledge and skills necessary for their role.

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.

There was a complaints procedure in place, which people’s relatives were aware of. Quality assurance processes such as audits, accidents and incidents, were used to drive improvements.

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 the service under the previous provider was good, published on 9 March 2019.

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.