Flo’s Friends is registered to provide care for people in their own homes. The service can provide care both for younger adults and for older people. It can also provide assistance for people who live with dementia, who have a physical disability and/or who have a learning disability. At the time of our inspection the service was providing care for 29 people, nearly all of whom were older people. The service had its office in Old Leake and covered villages to the east of Boston including Friskney and Stickney.

This was our first inspection of the service since it was registered by us on 1 December 2015.

The service was operated by an individual who was both the registered provider and the registered manager. A registered manager is a person who has registered with the Care Quality Commission 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. In this report when we speak about the individual who owned and managed the service we refer to them as being, ‘the registered person’.

The registered person and care staff knew how to keep people safe from situations in which they might experience abuse and people had been supported to avoid preventable accidents. Medicines were managed safely and people had been helped to obtain all of the healthcare they needed. There were enough care staff and background checks had been completed before care staff were employed.

Care staff had received all of the training and support they needed and they knew how to care for people in the right way. This included supporting people to eat and drink enough.

CQC is required by law to monitor how registered persons apply the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA) and to report on what we find. The registered person and care staff had received training in this subject and they helped people to make decisions for themselves. When people lacked the capacity to make their own decisions the principles of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and codes of practice were followed. This helped to protect people’s rights by ensuring decisions were made that were in their best interests.

People were treated with kindness and compassion. Care staff recognised people’s right to privacy and promoted their dignity. Confidential information was kept private.

People had been consulted about the care they wanted and they had been given all of the assistance they needed. This included people who lived with dementia and who needed extra support. Care staff recognised the importance of promoting equality and diversity by supporting people to make choices about their lives. This included choosing which hobbies and interests they wished to pursue. There were arrangements to quickly and fairly resolve complaints.

People had been consulted about the development of the service and quality checks had been completed. Good team working was fully promoted and care staff were supported to speak out if they had any concerns about poor practice. In addition, people had benefited from care staff acting upon good practice guidance.