The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has found improvements in the standard of care being provided in the community health services for children and young people at Birmingham Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust following an inspection in May.
A focused inspection was carried out due to receiving information of concern about low staffing numbers, particularly in the health visiting service. However, CQC were assured following the inspection that this wasn’t the case and people were receiving safe care.
The trust provides community-based healthcare to people of all ages across Birmingham and Dudley. It also provides specialist rehabilitation services to assist people to manage their disabilities.
Following the inspection, the overall rating for the service has now improved from requires improvement to good. It has also gone up from requires improvement to good for being safe, effective and well-led. It has improved from being inadequate to good for being responsive. The service was rated good again for being caring.
The overall rating for the trust remains unchanged as requires improvement.
Sonia Brooks, CQC deputy director of operations in the midlands, said:
“It was encouraging to see the improvements the trust had made in community health services for children and young people. We found leaders were managing priorities and issues to keep people safe, and staff were focused on the needs of people in their care.
“During our inspection, we found staff had training on how to protect children, young people and their families from abuse and worked well with external agencies to do so. Also, staff took time to interact with families in a respectful and considerate way, and during visits to people’s homes we saw staff were kind, respectful and compassionate. They also spent time with parents discussing their cultural and religious needs to help understand how best to meet these while providing safe care.
“Staff should be proud of their hard work and commitment in making these improvements. We will continue to monitor the service to ensure they are embedded and the trust continues to build on them to ensure children and young people are continuing to receive high quality care.”
Inspectors found:
- The service had enough staff to care for children, young people and families to keep them safe
- The service managed and controlled infection and prevention risks well
- Where staff gave medicines, these were managed well
- The service managed safety incidents well and learned lessons from them. Staff collected safety information and used it to improve the service
- Managers monitored the effectiveness of the service and made sure staff were competent
- Staff worked well together for the benefit of children, young people and their families, advised them on how to lead healthier lives, supported them to make decisions about their care, and had access to good information
- The service planned care to meet the needs of local people and took account of people’s individual needs
- People could access the service in a flexible way
- The service engaged well with children, young people and the community to plan and manage services and all staff were committed to improving services continually.
However:
- Staff in some offices did not know where the defibrillator was kept
- Staff did not always make it easy for people to give feedback
- Staff did not always have time to keep children’s and young people’s records up to date.