The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has dropped the rating for Golden Hands Home Care, in Colchester, from requires improvement to inadequate following an inspection in June, and placed the service into special measures to protect people.
OFFICE (known as Golden Hands Home Care) is a domiciliary care agency providing personal care to people with a physical disability or sensory impairment. At the time of our inspection there were 29 people using the service.
As well as Golden Hands Home Care’s overall rating dropping, its ratings for how responsive and well-led it is have also dropped to inadequate, it was rated requires improvement for how safe, effective and caring it was.
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 Golden Hands Home Care we were very disappointed to find a service that wasn’t responsive to people’s needs, carrying out care in a way that was convenient for staff and not for the people using the service.
“It was worrying that we saw signs of a closed culture, with people being told not to talk about safeguarding incidents, and not feeling safe to raise complaints. One person told us they’d be frightened to make a complaint as they liked their current carer and didn’t want to risk being removed from their current set up. Leaders at this service must also do more to protect people from the potential formation of a closed culture which can happen when lots of the staff are related or have personal relationships, as is the case at Golden Hands.
“It was also very concerning that people had become accustomed to poor care as it had been normalised. One person told us that even though they were incontinent, they wouldn’t phone the office for help if they soiled themselves as they knew they wouldn’t send anyone.
“Leaders don’t understand or recognise people's needs based on their values and beliefs. Some people told us they preferred carers of a certain gender to support them, but this was routinely not accommodated. This was raised at our last inspection and still hasn’t been resolved.
“However, most people told us they felt safe, as the care workers were friendly and pleasant, but felt the company had too many clients and not enough staff. The use of agency workers brought in people who didn’t always know what specific care was needed for individuals or sometimes spoke little English and couldn’t engage with people in a meaningful way.
“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:
- Where safeguarding incidents had occurred, people did not always feel well supported. One person said they were not allowed to talk to anybody about the incident and were made to feel like a criminal
- Many of the staff were related or had personal relationships. There was no robust policy in place to safeguard people and staff from potential conflict of interests or the formation of a closed culture arising from this practice
- While some care plans were written in a detailed and person-centred way, this was inconsistent. The language used to describe people was not always positive and respectful, such as describing people as moody or manipulative
- The company director was not aware of a change in the law requiring staff to receive mandatory training on supporting autistic people or people with a learning disability. Not all staff had received specific training in this area, despite the service being registered to provide this specialist support.
However:
- Risk assessments were in place covering areas such as mobility, falls, the home environment, catheters, and pressure care
- People were supported with eating and drinking, and what they liked and disliked was recorded.