A company providing home care for people with disabilities has been rated “outstanding” following an inspection.
Active Social Care Ltd, which has offices at Bradley and has clients across Kirklees, Calderdale and Bradford, was rated outstanding for effectiveness, responsiveness and leadership and rated “good” for being safe and caring after a visit by inspectors from the Care Quality Commission (CQC). The overall rating was “outstanding.”
The firm provides personal care to people living in their own homes with physical disabilities, learning disabilities and challenging behaviours, especially autism. The service also provides care and support to people living in a “supported living” setting.
Among its findings, the inspectors’ report said: “The provider had an excellent person-centred culture and this underpinned their service and was the foundation for their vision and values.
“The management team and staff were extremely committed to delivering a service which was exceptionally caring and empathetic.
“People and relatives overwhelmingly expressed their satisfaction about the service, telling us they could not manage without it.
“The service went to great lengths in ensuring that people and care staff were well-matched and shared the same interests in life or had similar personality traits. People had a choice in who cared for them and their feedback was sought on the effectiveness of the relationships.
“People were given encouragement and support to reach their full potential and live life to the full, assisted by passionate staff who were responsive to their needs. Staff were innovative in supporting people into employment and saw the impact they had on people’s lives when these outcomes were achieved.”
The service was “exceedingly” well-led with an emphasis on continuous improvement. “The registered manager encouraged staff to be innovative and there was a dynamic, positive and open culture at the service,” said the report. “Staff were ‘buzzing’ with ideas and examples of how they had implemented new ways of working to benefit the people using the service.”
The report said there had been complaints about the service and the CQC had been contacted about that before the inspection. But it said the inspectors were satisfied there were systems in place to deal with complaints fairly, openly and with transparency. All the people spoken to commented about how good the response had been when they had raised concerns.
A spokesperson for Active Social Care said: “We are very proud that we have achieved this ‘outstanding’ rating. It is a reflection of the commitment and passion of our staff in providing the best possible care to the people who use our services and wider community.
“We would like to thank our health and social care partners for their professional contributions, especially those who have adopted a co-production approach that has demonstrably improved people’s lives.
“We have benefitted from the support of Kirklees Registered Managers Network, Bradford Workforce Development Group and Skills for Care, who have shared knowledge, expertise and learning to enable us to improve and enhance our services.
“Most importantly, we would like to recognise all our clients and their families for working with us and supporting us to enable us achieve this rating. There are still many challenges ahead but we’ll conquer them together.
“This rating belongs to everyone involved with Active. Thank you again, you are all truly ‘outstanding’!”
