This announced inspection took place on 14 September 2018 and was the first comprehensive inspection for this service.

Hylton Care is a domiciliary care agency, and is also registered to support people in ‘supported living’ settings, so that they can live in their own home as independently as possible. At the time of this inspection Hylton Care were purely supporting people with the regulated activity of personal care as a domiciliary care agency. CQC only inspects the service being received by people provided with ‘personal care’; help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also take into account any wider social care provided.

The service did have a 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.

People received safe care and staffing arrangements were flexible to meet the needs of the people that were using the service. People received support with their medicines if they wished and systems were in place to record and report safeguarding incidents.

People’s needs were fully considered before they began to use the service to make sure their needs could be met. People's consent was gained before their care was provided. 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.

People were treated with dignity and respect and staff were able to get to know people by seeing the same people on a regular basis. People were encouraged to be independent and to make their own choices.

People had care plans in place which reflected their needs and these were updated when people’s needs changed. Complaint procedures were in place for people to make a complaint, and the registered manager had a good understanding of the requirements of end of life care but further work was required to develop this.

The provider had quality assurance systems in place to review the quality of the service and took action to make improvements where required. People and staff had opportunities to provide their feedback and this was fully considered and acted on.