Home Instead Portsmouth

On this page

• Overview
• Kindness, compassion and dignity
• Treating people as individuals
• Independence, choice and control
• Responding to people’s immediate needs
• Workforce wellbeing and enablement

Caring – this means we looked for evidence that the service involved people and treated them with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect. This was the first inspection for this service. This key question has been rated outstanding. This meant people were truly respected and valued as individuals; and empowered as partners in their care in an exceptional service.

This service scored 90 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

The service was exceptional at treating people with kindness, empathy and compassion and in how they respected people’s privacy and dignity. Staff always treated colleagues from other organisations with kindness and respect. People and family members all said they felt staff were exceptionally kind and caring. They described examples of when staff had gone the extra mile to support people. For example, when a person had been unwell a family member described how a staff member had “Returned during the evening and again this morning to see how Mum was. This really is `Above and Beyond`! I rang and told the office how marvellous she was.” A family member said of staff, “Kind, caring, compassionate and competent.” Another family member told us, “They are very, very friendly, they perk her up as Mum gets depressed. They treat everyone and everything with respect.” Staff demonstrated a real empathy for the people they cared for, talking about people with a very high degree of warmth and compassion.

The service treated people as individuals and was exceptional in how they made sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. The service took account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics. People were truly respected and valued as individuals and empowered to be partners in their care with a strong, visible person-centred culture lead by the provider and implemented by care staff. People’s personal histories and cultural backgrounds were known and the service matched people with staff of similar interests and personalities. For example, a staff member with a previous career in the navy was matched with an ex-serviceman and was able to arrange for some individual service memorabilia to be sent to the person. This really meant a lot to the person as they were able to talk about their service history with someone who understood them.

The service promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing. A family member said, “They appreciate that we are trying to keep Mum as independent as possible and encourage her to be more independent. That`s really good!” Care staff described how they undertook tasks with people and tried not to take over. For example, one staff member said, “She does her own laundry, she can still do that, so I just keep an eye whilst she’s doing it and do the hovering so she doesn’t feel like I’m watching her.”

The service listened to and understood people’s needs, views and wishes. Staff responded to people’s needs in the moment and acted to minimise any discomfort, concern or distress. A family member told us, “They [care staff] rang for an ambulance and stayed with her until I arrived too.” Whilst a person said, “If I want anything done they do it.”

The leadership of the service always cared about and promoted the wellbeing of their staff, and was exceptionally supportive and enabling of staff to always deliver person-centred care. An equality, diversity and human rights approach to supporting people and staff was embedded in the service. The service ensured staff were highly motivated to offer care and support that was exceptionally compassionate and kind. All care staff confirmed that the service supported their wellbeing to make sure they could give their best to people when at work. They told us they felt able to contact the office or on call and always received a warm friendly response no matter what time they called. An external professional told us, “Colleagues and I have worked with Home Instead Portsmouth to support people into work and see them thrive in the workplace and take pride in what they do. My experience is that they genuinely want to deliver a gold standard of support for their clients, and to do this, they understand that they need to have staff who align with their values and are focused on supporting the person and building meaningful, authentic relationships.”