Employ My Ability (EMA) received a Good rating across all five key questions at its first CQC inspection, demonstrating a strong person-centred culture, safe care practices and effective governance. Minor gaps in as-needed medication protocols and consistency of care plan descriptions were identified and largely addressed during the inspection.
Concerns (3)
minor
Medication management
: “People who did not routinely need pain relief did not have plans in place should they experience pain. This could have led to a delay in accessing pain relief.”
minorCare planning: “We noted that staff gave different descriptions of the support people needed for some tasks, this could lead to unnecessary challenges for people with learning disabilities and autistic people.”
minorStaffing levels: “The service had experienced the care sector wide challenges in ensuring they had enough staff...Some staff were working long hours.”
Strengths
· Strong person-centred culture with staff committed to supporting people's independence and aspirations
· Robust recruitment and induction processes matching staff to people's needs and preferences
· Effective incident management with lessons learned shared across the whole staff team via debrief messages
· Medicines managed safely with regular audits, staff training and competency assessments
· High-quality support plans personalised to individual needs, regularly reviewed with people and staff