Care Forum (MK)

Updated 1 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

The inspection visit to the service’s office was carried out by two inspectors.

Service and service type

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to children, young people and some adults living in their own houses and flats. It also supports one adult who lives in a care home. Throughout this report we have referred to all people receiving a service as ‘young people’.

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

We gave a short period of notice of the inspection because it is a small service and we needed to be sure that the provider or registered manager would be in the office to support the inspection.

Inspection activity started on 30 May 2019 and ended on 28 June 2019. We visited the office location on 30 May 2019.

What we did before the inspection

We looked at information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We sought feedback from the local authority and external professionals who work with the service. We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return (PIR). This is information providers are required to send us with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make. This information helps support our inspections. We used all of this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We met three people who used the service. Two people did not use words to communicate and the third person only wanted to speak a few words to us. We saw how people and staff interacted with each other. We spoke with one relative and five staff: the registered manager, deputy manager, two team leaders and one member of staff. Before the inspection the registered manager had sent people, their relatives, staff and external professionals a survey to complete. We looked at those surveys that had been returned.

We visited the office location and looked at care records, medication records, compliments/complaints and other records relating to the management of the service such as staff supervision records and audits.

After the inspection

The manager sent us further information and we received comments from three professionals who had regular contact with the service. We received comments from staff and relatives, both written and from telephone conversations. Some of these comments have been included in the report.

Updated 1 October 2019

About the service

Care Forum (MK) is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to children, young people and adults.

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

Young people and their families received exceptionally high-quality, person-centred care from an extremely caring and exceedingly well-led service. Young people with a wide range of needs were supported by staff to lead full, interesting and meaningful lives. Support for the young person also resulted in families having much-needed opportunities for a break. We saw that young people had excellent, warm, caring relationships with the staff and enjoyed their company.

Staff had high regard for the safety of the young people they were supporting. They undertook training in safeguarding and protecting young people from abuse and avoidable harm and were confident to report any concerns. Young people were pro-actively supported to take risks safely. There were enough staff to keep young people safe and recruitment ensured that staff were suitable to work at this service. Medicines were given safely. Communication and sharing of information was very good and lessons learnt when things went wrong.

Staff were exceptionally kind, compassionate and caring. They provided fully personalised support that focussed on what the young person and their family wanted. Staff fully understood how to support young people’s privacy and dignity and they encouraged young people to be as independent as possible. Staff supported people to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

A team of highly motivated and dedicated staff provided a service that was fully responsive to the needs of each young person and their family. Staff had ‘gone the extra mile’ on numerous occasions, often in their own time, to make sure that young people were able to fulfil their wishes and dreams.

The service was exceptionally well-led by a registered manager who inspired the staff team to put the people they were supporting at the heart of everything they did. The provider’s values were put into practice by the staff and governance systems ensured the service provided was of the highest possible quality. Young people, their relatives and staff were always involved in improving all aspects of running the service and their voices were heard.

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 outstanding (report published 20 October 2016).

Why we inspected

This was a planned inspection based on the previous rating.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Care Forum (MK) 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.