This inspection was carried out on 30 May 2018 and was announced. We gave the service notice of our inspection, so that people using the service could be contacted to determine if they wished to see us. The service was registered with the Care Quality Commission in May 2017 to provide personal care. This was the first time the service had been inspected.

1 Oak Home Care is a domiciliary service providing personal care to people in their own homes. At the time of our inspection there were twenty-six people using the service.

The service had a registered manager in post at the time of our inspection. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

Personalised risk assessments were in place to reduce the risk of harm to people and were reviewed regularly. The staff were aware of risk assessments and understood the safeguarding processes. Incidents were recorded and the causes of these analysed so that preventative action could be taken to reduce the likelihood of re-occurrences. People received their medicines as they had been prescribed and there were robust procedures for the safe management of medicines. Infection control training had been provided to all staff. The senior staff of the service held meetings to review the service and continually assess how the service could be improved.

There were sufficient numbers of knowledgeable staff to attend the planned care visits to support people with their assessed needs. Staff worked in a flexible manner to support people at different times and on different days to meet their needs. Robust recruitment and selection processes were in place and the registered manager had taken steps to ensure that staff were suitable to work with people who used the service.

All staff received training to ensure that they had the necessary skills to care for and support the people who used at the service and were supported by supervision and appraisals.

People’s needs had been assessed before they began to use the service and their relatives and other healthcare professionals had been involved as required, in determining their support needs. People’s consent was gained before any care was provided.

People are supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff support them in the least restrictive way possible; the polices and systems in the practice support this practice.

People using the service were supported to make choices about what they did and decide what food and drink they wished to consume. Staff had supported people to make informed choices by providing information about healthy living choices.

Staff were understanding, empathic and protected people’s dignity. People were treated with respect and supported with regard to their individual needs.

On-going assessments of people’s needs were planned in advance. Information was available to people and relatives about how they could make a complaint should they need to do so. There were reviews of the care provided with the person and family members as appropriate. People were supported to raise concerns.

People and their relatives were asked for feedback about the service to enable improvements to be made. The service had a statement of purpose and an effective quality assurance system was in place to monitor and plan the future delivery of the service. Staff viewed that the senior staff were approachable and would listen to suggestions to develop the service.