The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has dropped the rating for Independent Excel Care Consortium Ltd (IECC Care), in Colchester, from good to inadequate following inspection in June and July and placed the service into special measures.
IECC Care is a domiciliary care agency which also operates seven supported living services. At the time of the inspection 147 people were using the service.
As well as IECC Care’s overall rating dropping, its ratings for safe and well-led also dropped to inadequate, it was rated requires improvement for effective, caring and responsive.
CQC has placed the service into special measures to focus the provider’s attention on making rapid and widespread improvements. CQC will closely monitor the service during this time to keep people safe and will inspect again to assess if improvements are made.
Hazel Roberts, CQC deputy director of operations in the East of England, said:
“When we inspected IECC Care we found that the service couldn’t guarantee they keep people safe from abuse or avoidable harm. Safeguarding issues weren’t logged properly, and one incident CQC was informed by the police and not the service.
“Risks weren’t well managed, leaving people at risk of choking or falling, with one person suffering a serious injury from a fall, with no clear plans put in place to mitigate it happening again.
"The service didn’t always put people’s needs first. There was no robust system to monitor care visits, so they couldn’t identify when care visits were late or missed, with some people telling the carer the next day that the previous appointment had been missed.
“There were also no specific times for people to receive a care visit, instead people were seen within a window of time meaning some visits were close together. On one example we found carers made their breakfast, lunch and bedtime visits within five hours, which is unacceptable. People also told us staff were always rushing and didn’t always stay for the allocated time.
“We received mixed feedback from people regarding being treated with dignity and respect. One person told us 99% of carers are wonderful, however other people told us they didn’t feel their dignity was considered, such as whether they’d be more comfortable with a male or female carer.
“We’ll continue to monitor the service closely to ensure significant improvements are made and won’t hesitate to take further action if we’re not assured people are receiving the safe and dignified care they deserve.”
Inspectors also found:
- People's care needs were not consistently met due to the service's lack of oversight and monitoring of care visits. This impacted on people's ability to have sufficient choice and control of their care
- Leaders were not sufficiently visible in the service and people stated that it was hard to make contact and get feedback from the office.
- Recruitment procedures were not established and operated effectively to ensure staff recruited were able to provide care and treatment appropriate to their role
- Staff were not provided with appropriate support, training, supervision and appraisal.
However:
- People spoken with told us most staff members showed warmth and respect when interacting with them.