About the service: Ambito Community Service Cornwall provides care and support to children, adults and families living in their own homes with a range of physical and learning disabilities. The service’s office is based in a community centre in Mevagissy. Packages of care and support ranged from a few hours to twenty-four-hour packages. The service was supporting seventeen people who needed support with personal care who were using the service.

The care service has been developed and designed in line with the values that underpin the Registering the Right Support and other best practice guidance. These values include choice, promotion of independence and inclusion. People with learning disabilities and autism using the service can live as ordinary a life as any citizen.

People’s experience of using this service: Reduced staffing levels had resulted in some calls being missed or cancelled by the service.

There was no formal call monitoring system which would support the service to monitor and manage calls more effectively. We have made a recommendation about this.

Staff were recruited in a safe way. There was a recruitment programme taking place at the time of inspection to extend the staff team.

Some people did not feel confident in how the service responded to concerns. We have asked the service to consider and improve this.

People received person centred care and support based on their individual needs and preferences. Staff were aware of people's life history, and their communication needs. They used this information to develop positive, meaningful relationships with people.

Systems were in place to protect people from the risk of abuse.

Staff were supported by a system of induction, training, one-to-one supervision and appraisals to ensure they were effective in their role.

People received their medicines safely.

Staff liaised with other health care professionals to ensure people's safety and meet their health needs.

Staff were respectful of the fact they were working in people's homes.

People were supported to have maximum choice and control of their lives and staff supported them in the least restrictive way possible. The policies and systems in the service supported this practice. Some people had ‘Best interest’ decisions in place to keep them safe. This had been done in line with the requirements of the legislation as laid out in the Mental Capacity Act (2005).

The registered manager and management team used a variety of methods to assess and monitor the quality of the service. These included staff meetings, spot checks, auditing of the service and surveys to seek people’s views about the service provided.

Why we inspected: This was the first planned inspection since the change of registration in 2018.

We identified one breach of the Health and Social Care Act (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014 relating to staffing and good governance. Details of action we have asked the provider to take can be found at the end of this report.

Follow up: We will ask the registered manager to provide an action plan outlining how they will make the necessary improvements. We will continue to monitor the service and will re-inspect in line with our inspection programme.