Archived: Homecare4u Midlands

Homecare4u Midlands is a domiciliary care service providing care to 52 people at the time of the inspection. Not everyone who used the service received personal care. CQC only inspects where people receive personal care. This is help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also consider any wider social care provided.

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

Systems around medicines management required improvement. We identified there had been instances where medicine administration records (MAR) had not been signed. We found failings in the provider’s quality assurance systems around medicines management to ensure action taken on identified shortfalls resulted in improvement. For one person we identified an increased risk regarding pressure and skin care arrangements and formal assessment of these risks were needed. People told us that care staff always turned up for their visits however we did receive some comments that indicated call times could be improved.

People told us that they felt safe using the service and staff were confident that any concerns would be dealt with appropriately. Where safeguarding concerns had been raised, they had been responded to and acted on appropriately. The provider had an electronic call monitoring system where staff logged in and out of their calls, which enabled care staff visits and punctuality to be monitored. Staff followed infection control guidance and had access to personal protective equipment.

Staff were knowledgeable about their role and told us they received sufficient training. Staff felt supported in their role. People who used the service told us that staff were kind and caring and treated them with dignity and respect. We saw the provider had contacted the necessary health and social care professionals when people's health deteriorated

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.

Where complaints had been received, they had been responded to appropriately and analysed for any lessons to be learnt. Accidents and incidents were routinely recorded and acted upon. Information was analysed for any trends and actions were taken to reduce the risk of reoccurrence. A number of quality audits were in place to drive improvement in the service.

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 requires improvement. Since this rating was awarded the services has moved premises. This service was registered with us on 28/09/2018 and this is the first inspection.

Why we inspected

This was a planned inspection based on the date the service was registered with us.