Manchester care service is rated inadequate and placed in special measures by CQC

This inspection was prompted in part due to concerns received about the standard of care the service was providing to people.

The Elms, run by Rhombus Care Group Limited, provides care and support to people living in supported living settings, so that they can live as independently as possible. It provides support to adults with a sensory impairment, learning disability or autistic people. At the time of this inspection there were 12 people using the service.

Following this inspection, the overall rating for the service is inadequate. It is also rated inadequate for being safe and well-led. It is rated requires improvement for being effective, caring and responsive.

The service is now in special measures which means it will be kept under review, by CQC and re-inspected to check sufficient improvements have been made.

Debbie Ivanova, CQC’s director for people with a learning disability and autistic people, said: 

“When we inspected The Elms, we found people weren’t always supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives. People’s needs and choices weren’t always consistently recorded, therefore it wasn’t clear if they received the care they wished for. Also, there was limited evidence of people and their relatives being involved in care planning.

“People weren’t always safeguarded from abuse. We found a number of incidents and concerns that should have been raised with the local authority’s safeguarding team, that hadn’t been. Staff had received safeguarding training, however the appropriate processes and procedures weren’t being followed to keep people safe which is not acceptable.

“As the service has been rated inadequate and placed in special measures. We will continue to monitor it closely to ensure people are safe. If we are not assured people are receiving safe care, we will not hesitate to take further action in line with our regulatory powers as no one should have to live in a service that cannot meet their needs.”

Inspectors found:

• The service did not always promote a positive, open culture.
• Necessary consent forms were not always in place and independence was not always promoted.
• Risks were not always being assessed and managed and accidents and incidents were not always recorded appropriately.
• While staff sometimes worked in partnership with other agencies, this was not consistent and there was no evidence to demonstrate that lessons were being learned from incidents and concerns.
• Processes were not always followed to ensure people were safeguarded from abuse and a number of incidents and concerns had not been safeguarded that should have been.
• There was a complaints policy in place, but this was not always followed.
• Quality assurance systems and audits were not robust, and some policies were not being followed. Some documents were not in place and some were lacking detail.

The report will be published on CQC’s website here in the next few days. 

Press release courtesy of the Care Quality Commission.