5 November 2020
During an inspection looking at part of the service
Here2Care (Dartford) is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care and support to people in their own homes in Dartford, Gravesend and surrounding areas. Here2Care (Dartford) also provide support to people living in Extra Care Housing. 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. At the time of inspection there were 187 people using the service, of which, 175 people received support with personal care. This included twenty people living in an Extra Care Housing, including older people, people who live with dementia and people with a physical disability.
People’s experience of using this service and what we found
Feedback from people and relatives was positive. People told us they, “Felt safe and had good relationships with the staff that visit them.” One relative told us, “I have had no worries at all during the Covid-19 pandemic that my [relative] has not been safe.” And, “My [relative] is never rushed and the [staff] are all so kind to him.”
People were protected from the risk of abuse, with staff able to recognise the signs and different types and knew what actions to take to keep people safe. Concerns were raised when needed with guidance in place to manage this effectively. People were supported with their medicines as prescribed and staff competency was checked to ensure they knew how to complete this safely. There were adequate numbers of staff to ensure people’s needs were met and the provider had safe recruitment procedures in place. There was clear oversight of accident and incidents, when these had occurred, action was taken to reduce any risk of reoccurrence. Staff ensured risks of infection to people were minimised.
Feedback from staff and people was actively sought and analysed. There was a clear and open culture of learning from past mistakes and concerns.
Quality monitoring systems had improved and where issues were identified they were acted upon. The service is using a new electronic call monitoring system to reduce the risk of any missed or severely delayed care visits. The service worked in partnership with other agencies to provide good outcomes for people.
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 7 February 2020) and there were three 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
We carried out an announced inspection of this service on 5 November 2020. At last inspection there were three breaches of regulation in relation to Safe care and treatment (Regulation 12) Staffing (Regulation 18) and Good Governance (Regulation 17) The provider completed an action plan after the last inspection to show what they would do and by when they would improve.
We undertook this focused inspection to check they had followed their action plan and to confirm they now met legal requirements. This report only covers our findings in relation to the Key Questions of Safe and Well-led which contain those requirements.
The ratings from the previous comprehensive inspection for those key questions not looked at on this occasion were used in calculating the overall rating at this inspection. The overall rating for the service has changed from Requires Improvement to Good. This is based on the findings at this inspection.
You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Here2Care (Dartford) on our website at www.cqc.org.uk
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.