Pearl Home Care Ltd

Updated 29 July 2022

The inspection

We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 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 Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Inspection team

The inspection was carried out by one inspector.

Service and service type.

This service is a domiciliary care agency. It provides personal care to people living in their own houses and flats.

Registered Manager

This service is required to have a registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. 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. At the time of our inspection there was a registered manager in post.

Notice of inspection

We gave the service short notice of the inspection. This was 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 22 June 2022 and ended on 21 July 2022. We visited the office on 1 July 2022.

What we did before the inspection

We reviewed information we had received about the service since the last inspection. We received feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service. The provider was not asked to complete a provider information return prior to this inspection. 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 information gathered as part of monitoring activity that took place on 3 May 2022 to help plan the inspection and inform our judgements.

During the inspection

We spoke with two people who used the service and five relatives via the telephone about their experience of the care provided and obtained feedback from commissioners. We spoke with five members of staff including the, registered manager, team leader and care workers.

We reviewed a range of records. This included two people’s care records, medication records and daily records. We looked at four staff files in relation to recruitment and staff supervision. A variety of records relating to the management of the service, including incidents and policies were reviewed.

Updated 29 July 2022

About the service:

Pearl Home Care Ltd is a care at home service which provides personal care and support to older adults. At the time of our inspection there were 19 people using the service.

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:

People told us they felt safe, all people spoke highly of the staff. One person said, “They [staff] are excellent, I can’t recommend them enough, brilliant service.” Staff understood safeguarding and whistleblowing procedures. There were sufficient staff employed to meet people’s needs and staff confirmed this. Accidents and incidents were monitored. Risks to people were identified and assessments were in place for staff to follow, ensuring people’s needs were met. People were protected by the prevention and control of infection. Medication systems were in place to ensure safe administration of medicines. There was a recruitment process, which was improved further following our inspection to evidence it was a robust process.

We have made a recommendation to ensure the recruitment evidence is readily accessible to evidence robust checks are completed.

Staff we spoke with were knowledgeable about people needs. Staff had received effective training to ensure their knowledge was up to date. Staff were supervised and supported. People were supported in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests

There was an effective quality monitoring system in place. People who used the service and their relatives felt listened to and said any issues or concerns were appropriately dealt with and resolved. People’s views were obtained to drive improvements. Feedback we received from staff was extremely positive about the leadership and support received for them to be able to fulfil their roles and responsibilities.

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 12 October 2018) and there was a breach 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:

This inspection was prompted by a review of the information we held about this service and to follow up on action we told the provider to take at the last inspection.

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 Safe and Well-led which contain those requirements.

For those key questions not inspected, we used the ratings awarded at the last inspection to calculate the overall rating. The overall rating for the service has changed from requires improvement to good. This is based on the findings at this inspection.

Follow Up:

We will continue to monitor information we receive about the service, which will help inform when we next inspect.