Aurora Home Care Ltd

Updated 23 May 2023

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 Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Inspection team

The inspection was completed by 1 inspector and 2 Experts 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.

Service and service type

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

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 no registered manager in post, but a new manager had recently started in post and had started the registration process.

Notice of inspection

This inspection was announced. We gave a short period of notice to support us in gaining consent to contact people and gain their views. Inspection activity started on 20 April 2023 and ended on 2 May 2023. We visited the location’s office on 24 April. We also visited 2 people in their homes on 2 May 2023.

What we did before the inspection

We used the information the provider sent us in the provider information return (PIR). This is information providers are required to send us annually with key information about their service, what they do well, and improvements they plan to make.

We contacted local authority commissioners and safeguarding teams; and Healthwatch. Healthwatch is an independent consumer champion that gathers and represents the views of the public about health and social care services in England. We used this information to plan our inspection.

During the inspection

We spoke with 13 people and 10 relatives. We met with the new manager, a director, and the regional operations manager.

We visited a further 2 people in their homes and met with 1 member of care staff and the new manager at the property.

We contacted all staff to gather feedback either via email, telephone or in person. We also contacted 8 care managers and social workers to gather their feedback.

We reviewed 5 people’s care and medicine records in full and various records in part. We looked at multiple records relating to the management of the service and quality monitoring systems. We also reviewed 4 staff files in relation to recruitment, support, and training.

Updated 23 May 2023

About the service

Aurora Home Care Ltd is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to a range of people with health and social care needs in their own homes. At the time of the inspection, 58 people received support.

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

People said they felt safe, and that staff were kind and caring to them.

Care plans and risks to people's health, safety and welfare were in the process of a fully review by the new manager as a new system had been purchased and needed to be embedded.

We have made a recommendation about staffing. The provider had enough staff and had a continuous safe recruitment programme in place. People reported some calls running late and rotas often not sent out. The provider was addressing this and had employed new care coordinators to support this process, along with a new manager. The rostering system needed further work.

We have made a recommendation about governance. Quality assurance checks had improved and were starting to be fully utilised by the new manager and provider. Actions identified were not always recorded as having been followed up.

We have made a recommendation about communication. People and staff said that this was improving but further work was needed.

Medicines were generally managed well, and people received them in a timely manner. The new manager was in the process of reviewing medicines procedures.

Staff training had improved. The new manager had a training background and intended to fully review training to enhance the staff team’s abilities.

Staff followed infection control procedures and enough PPE was available to support the team.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible and in their best interests; the policies and systems in the service supported this practice.

Staff worked in partnership with health care professionals to support people in their homes.

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 10 October 2022) and there were breaches of regulations. 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.

At our last inspection we recommended that the provider review their rostering system and infection control procedures. At this inspection we found the provider had acted on these recommendations and improvements had been made, although further recommendations were made.

Why we inspected

We undertook this focused inspection to check the provider 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, Effective 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 based on the findings of this inspection. Please see the safe, effective, and well-led sections of this full report.

You can read the report from our last comprehensive inspection, by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Aurora Home Care Ltd on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

Follow up

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