This announced inspection took place on the 7 and 13 March 2017. Nurses Friend provides a personal care service to people who live in their own homes in the community. There was one person using the service at the time of this inspection.

There was a registered manager in post at the time of our inspection. 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.

We were unable to rate the agency as there was not sufficient information available to us to fully assess how safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led the service was.

People told us that they felt safe. There were policies and procedures in place which ensured that the staff had the guidance and support they needed to ensure that they protected people from any harm or poor practice.

People had care plans and risk assessments in place which ensured that they received the support they had asked for in a safe way. At the time of the inspection there were sufficient staff to meet people’s needs; more staff were to be recruited as and when more people requested the service.

There were systems in place to ensure that people were protected from being cared for by unsuitable staff. Staff received training and support which ensured that they had the skills and knowledge to provide the care that was needed.

There were systems in place to assess people’s capacity for decision making under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and the provider was aware of their responsibilities in relation to ensuring people gave their consent to care.

The provider had systems in place to monitor the quality of the service as and when it developed and had a process in place which ensured people could raise any complaints or concerns.