SENSE - Community Services (South East)

Updated 7 August 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.This inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

Inspection team:

The inspection was carried out by one inspector and an Expert by Experience. An Expert by Experience is a person who has personal experience of using or caring for someone who uses this type of care service. The Expert by Experience had expertise in deafblindness. The Expert by Experience made telephone calls to relatives of people who used the service.

Service and service type:

The Intervenor service was provided in people's homes and their local community People receiving this service lived in a variety of settings, including with families and a residential care home. The service was provided for children and adults who are deafblind.

The service had two managers 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. One registered manager was on maternity leave and the other was registered in order to manage the service in her absence.

Notice of inspection:

We gave the service four days’ notice of the inspection site visit because it is small and the manager is often out of the office supporting staff or providing care. We needed to be sure that they would be in. We visited the office location on 27 March 2019 to see the manager and staff; and to review care records and policies and procedures.

What we did:

Before the inspection we reviewed all the information we held about this service. This included notifications received by the Commission. A notification is information about important events which the service is required to tell us about by law. We asked the service to complete a Provider Information Return. This is information we require providers to send us at least once annually to give some key information about the service, what the service does well and improvements they plan to make.

During the inspection we met the registered manager and two intervenor staff. We met three people who used the intervenor service at the daycentre they attended. We spoke with two of them. We observed the interaction between the intervenor staff and people who used the service.

As part of the inspection we spoke with five people’s relatives by telephone and two staff from care homes where two people using the service lived. We spoke with three intervenor staff on the telephone and we also had feedback from a local authority who commission the intervenor service for people. We reviewed four people’s care records which included needs assessments, care plans, risk assessments and medicines records.

We looked at staff training and supervision records. We also looked at other records, policies and procedures involved in the running of the service. These were; accidents and incidents, complaints, safeguarding and quality assurance records.

Updated 7 August 2019

About the service: SENSE Community services (South East) is a service which includes providing personal care support to people in their own homes. The intervenor service provides one to one support to children and adults born with sight and hearing impairments, known as congenital deafblindness. Most people using this service also had a learning disability. The role of the intervenor is to help the deafblind person to interact and communicate with the family and the outside world. The provider is Sense, a national charity organisation for people who are deafblind. The term 'deafblind' covers a wide range of people, some of whom may or may not be totally deaf and blind. At the time of the inspection, 18 people were being supported by Sense - Community Services (South East) intervenor service, of whom five received support with personal care.

People’s experience of using this service:

People had a very good experience using this service. They were matched with an intervenor who spent individual time with them, supported them to enrich their life, trying new activities, learning new skills and choosing how they wanted to be supported.

Staff had developed good meaningful relationships with people they supported. They showed an exceptional level of understanding of people's needs and of working in a person-centred way. People using the service and their relatives gave very positive feedback about the intervenor service.

People were involved in planning their support and those people important to them, families and other professionals involved in their care, were consulted and updated regularly.

The service addressed risks to people’s safety in a considered way balancing safety with positive risk taking. Risks for each person were considered taking account of their needs and wishes and clear guidance was provided to staff on how to ensure people could do what they wanted to and keep safe. The service encouraged positive risk taking so that people could try new things.

Staff were trained in safeguarding adults and children and had a good understanding of how to recognise abuse and how to respond to it. The service took a proactive approach to ensuring staff kept their knowledge up to date.

People’s medicines were managed safely and the service had reduced the use of medicines to calm behaviour by working with a person in a person-centred way which in turn reduced their anxiety.

Staff were well trained and supported including specialised training for the role. The service regularly assessed staff competence. Staff showed exceptional skills and knowledge about supporting deafblind people.

There were detailed assessments and information to enable staff to provide an effective service based on the person's needs and preferences. The person was at the heart of the service and staff treated each person with respect.

Consent forms were on occasions signed by people not authorised to consent on a person's behalf. The registered manager agreed to immediately address this.

People were exceptionally involved in planning their support and those people important to them, families and other professionals involved in their care, were consulted and updated regularly.

Professional feedback was that the service is excellent and that some people have achieved skills beyond the expectations of other professionals involved with them.

There were two registered managers, one was registered whilst covering the registered manager who was on maternity leave. There was good leadership by both registered managers and effective quality monitoring systems in place to ensure continuous improvement.

Staff enjoyed their jobs and gave very positive feedback about the support and direction provided to them by both registered managers. The managers felt well supported by the provider.

The service met the characteristics of a good service in all areas. More information is in the full report.

Rating at last inspection: The rating at the last inspection was Good (report published in November 2016).

Why we inspected: This was a scheduled inspection based on previous rating.

Follow up: Going forward we will continue to monitor this service and plan to inspect in line with our re-inspection schedule for those services rated Good.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk