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GO Online: Inspection toolkit

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Caring

Caring looks at how services develop positive relationships by involving people in their care, providing high and consistent levels kindness and compassion and treating them with dignity and respect.

Click on the sections below to see what the CQC will be asking when inspecting Caring, as well as our recommendations, practical examples, and resources to help you prepare.

Introducing Caring

Duration 02 min 04 sec

The CQC focus on Caring will look to ensure that managers and your staff teams truly care for the people they support.

In order to meet this area of inspection, it is important that you develop positive relationships with people, making them feel valued and loved.

It is expected that you and your team take people’s wishes into account, respect their choices, and achieve the best possible outcomes for them. This includes supporting people to live as independently as possible.

It’s important that your staff team are consistent in how they care for people, there’s no room for “some carers are nicer than others” type feedback if you want to achieve a Good or Outstanding rating.

CQC inspectors are likely to look at the following area to check whether your service is Caring:

  • Kindness, compassion and dignity, including how you make the people you support feel loved and respected.
  • Treating people as individuals, including how you tailor your care and support to people’s needs and preferences, cultural background and protected characteristics.
  • Independence, choice and control covers what you do to ensure people know their rights and have both choice and control over their care and treatment.
  • Responding to people’s immediate needs. This includes how you promptly you act to minimise discomfort, concern or distress.

  • Workforce wellbeing and enablement takes a closer look at what you have in place to support the wellbeing of your own staff teams.

Caring is an area of CQC inspection that the majority of services do well in … but it is always important to check how you comply with their latest expectations and inspection focus.

GO Online brings together information to help your service meet or exceed CQC’s expectations.

Watch the film here: https://vimeo.com/787631148

Caring - What outstanding care looks like

Duration 03 min 52 sec

Vivian Laurent, General Manager, Eglantine Villa

  • Caring is what you give the resident every day and how you approach them. You talk to them and, you know, the happiness that you bring to their life.
  • When you walk round and you see them and the smile on their face when talking to you about their day, about what they are planning to do, this is what Caring is for me.

Emily Voce, Activities Coordinator – Eglantine Villa

  • We’re a family. We’re here to put a smile on people’s faces, and its quality not quantity. So, some of our residents here might not have long left but we’re here to make that the best possible time that they can.
  • Some of our residents here are really lucky to have family and some of our residents don’t have anybody. So we are their family, we are the ones that sees them through the good times, the bad times, the hospital appointments, the ups, the downs, the teas, the coffees.

Antonia Thompson

  • Everything.

Emily Voce, Activities Coordinator – Eglantine Villa

  • Yes, that’s us.

Vivian Laurent, General Manager, Eglantine Villa

  • I am proud of this team. It is a fantastic team working here. That’s why they call us outstanding because they are outstanding. They will go the extra mile every day.

Ken Rogers, Husband of resident - Eglantine Villa

  • The care home itself is more like, how can I say, a family gathering. Nothing is too much trouble for anybody. They are always here on hand to help and I couldn’t wish for a better place for my wife to be here.

Louise Rogers, Resident - Eglantine Villa

  • The staff are very nice.

Ken Rogers, Husband of resident - Eglantine Villa

  • Go on you say it, they always look after you don’t they?

Louise Rogers, Resident - Eglantine Villa

  • Yes.

Ken Rogers, Husband of resident - Eglantine Villa

  • Yes, they do, yes.

Katie Brennan, Registered Branch Manager – Carefound Home Care

  • Caring to Carefound is all about, I think the client. It’s making sure that we are listening to what they are saying so we are meeting their needs – and not necessarily the needs of what other people think that they should have. And that means then that they are being well looked after and they are getting what they want out of the service and it’s all about their choices and preferences.

Linda Smith, Daughter of client - Carefound Home Care

  • Mum ended up as the first client basically and they have been absolutely brilliant every since, haven’t they?

Mrs Hilda Ratcliffe, Client - Carefound Home Care

  • And they’re so cheerful when they come in. I like them all, they’re lovely. It just makes my day.

Laurie Cook, Shared Lives Support Officer, Lancashire Country Council

  • One of the things that we do as part of our regular support and monitoring for care is talk about meaningful activities for people, and meaningful activities can mean different things to different people.
  • And we make it part of our role to make sure people are offered as many choices as possible about what they’d like to do. And what we are also keen to do is to give people new opportunities to try new things as well. That be something as simple as going for regular walks to joining a drama group, a whole range of different activities.

Wendy Donkin, Shared Lives Carer, Lancashire Country Council

  • Just recently Melissa had never travelled independently but that’s something that she wanted to do, so we arranged a taxi firm and I did some travel training with her, so it would give her independence so she could go to the day service.

Jackie Hollands, Team Leader - Eglantine Villa

  • To work at an outstanding home, we’ve all worked very hard to achieve this and its good that we have achieved this outstanding position. And I think it’s important to know that we are doing the best we can for the residents we look after.

Watch the film here: https://vimeo.com/485865721


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