Archived: Kingstanding - Birmingham

Updated 8 June 2015

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider is meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

We inspected the offices of Kingstanding – Birmingham on 23 April 2015. The registered person was given 48 hours’ notice that we would be visiting the office because the location provides a domiciliary care service and we needed to be sure that someone would be in the office when we visited.

One inspector carried out this inspection. As part of our inspection we spoke with five people and four relatives of people that used the service. We spoke with the registered manager, deputy manager, a team leader, a senior carer and two care workers. We looked at the information we hold about this service. This included notifications about deaths, accidents and safeguarding alerts and information from local authorities. A notification is information about important events which the registered person is required to send us by law.

During our visit to the office we looked at the care records of four people that received a service and the personnel files of four staff to look at the recruitment process and training provided to staff. We also looked at other records associated with the running of the agency including staffing rosters, complaints and systems to monitor the quality of the service.

Updated 8 June 2015

The inspection took place on 23 April 2015 and was announced. We told the registered manager two days before our visit that we would be visiting to ensure the registered manager was available.

We last inspected the service on 27 May 2014. At that inspection we saw that there was a lack of systems for monitoring the quality of the service provided. At this inspection we saw that some systems had been introduced so monitoring of the service provided could take place but there was a lack of trends analysis and action plans to address shortfalls identified in the service.

Kingstanding – Birmingham is a domiciliary care service that provides care and support to people living in their own homes. Some people’s care was funded through the local authority and some people purchased their own care. At the time of our inspection 50 people received support from this service.

There was a registered manager in post. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

People were protected from abuse because staff were able to recognise the signs and symptoms of abuse and knew how to raise concerns. Staff had received training that enabled them to provide safe care and support.

Risk assessments were in place so that staff knew how to support people safely and although staff raised concerns with senior staff the appropriate actions were not always taken by office staff and this could leave people at risk of not having their needs met.

There were sufficient numbers of trained staff that had had the appropriate recruitment checks to ensure that people received safe care and support.

People were happy with the care and support they received from their regular care workers who were knowledgeable about their needs, trained, supported to carry out their roles and attended at the agreed times.

People were supported to take their medicines as prescribed.

People were able to make decision about their care and were actively involved in how their care was planned. There were some instances when the actions taken to protect people who were at risk of leaving their homes unescorted had not been recorded and agreed by the people. This meant that people’s rights were not always protected

People were supported to eat and drink sufficient amounts to remain healthy and where needed medical support was accessed.

People had developed caring and friendly relationships with their care workers who provided personalised care. People’s privacy and dignity was maintained and their independence promoted.

People were able to raise concerns and felt listened to and their concerns adequately addressed.

There were systems in place to gather the views of people on the quality of the service to ensure this was provided appropriately. This included anonymous questionnaires, complaints procedure and reviews of care. The results of the last questionnaire were not available for inspection.

There were internal audits and external visits by the registered provider but there was no evidence of the analysis of these audits available for inspection.