About the service: Samorem Health Care is a domiciliary care agency, who were providing personal care to 3 people at the time of the inspection. Other people were also in receipt of support which we do not regulate.

People’s experience of using this service: People, a relative and a person’s advocate spoke positively about the staff who supported them and the registered manager. We were told that staff arrived on time and at times people were happy with. Staff worked their allotted times and were not rushed. People’s representatives believed the people they cared about had a better quality of life because of the input of the staff and the registered manager.

An advocate said, “[Name of person’s] health, their appearance, and the appearance of their home has actually improved. [Name of person] is happy now.”

We found that when people were unwell or if there were potential concerns the registered manager took appropriate and quick action to respond to this. People received their medicines as prescribed.

Effective plans to support the service to continue in an emergency were not in place.

Staff recruitment checks were not always completed, and staff did not always have the knowledge about how to fully protect people from abuse.

Risk assessments were in place but did not fully explore the needs and risks which people faced. Care plans did not give detailed guidance to inform staff how to care for people in a safe way. People did not have meaningful reviews of their care.

Staff training, and knowledge was not tested by the management of the service to ensure it was effective. Staff did not receive regular checks on their practice. Training was not always tailored to people’s needs.

People told us that they were happy with the support they received with their meals and drinks. A person’s relative complimented the staff at supporting their relative to eat the cultural foods that they enjoyed and had eaten all their life.

Systems to check the quality of the service were not in place.

There were breaches in the Health and Social Care Act 2008.

Rating at last inspection: This is Samorem Health Care’s first inspection.

Why we inspected: This was the first inspection based on when the service first registered with the Care Quality Commission.

Follow up: We have asked the provider to send us an action plan telling us what steps they are to take to make the improvements needed. We will continue to monitor information and intelligence we receive about the service to ensure the necessary improvements are made. We will return to re-inspect in line with our inspection timescales for Requires Improvement services.

For more details, please see the full report which is on the CQC website at www.cqc.org.uk