Home Instead Durham is an Outstanding-rated domiciliary care agency serving 58 people, distinguished by an exceptional person-centred culture, innovative community engagement, and highly effective leadership that external professionals cited as a model for the sector. The Safe key question declined from Outstanding to Good since the 2018 inspection, while Caring and Well-led retained Outstanding ratings; Effective and Responsive were not inspected and carried forward from the previous report.
Strengths
· Exceptionally person-centred culture with staff matched to clients based on hobbies and preferences, fostering trust and dignity
· Outstanding leadership driving innovation including dementia research participation, public dementia training workshops, and Memory Café
· Strong community engagement including 'Be a Santa to a Senior' scheme and community activity guides to combat loneliness
· Effective governance systems with audits, regular feedback surveys, and transparent communication when things go wrong
· Safe medicines management, robust safeguarding systems, and proactive risk management including financial scam awareness advice
Quality-Statement breakdown (11)
safe: Systems and processes to safeguard people from the risk of abuseGood
safe: Assessing risk, safety monitoring and management; Learning lessons when things go wrongGood
safe: Staffing and recruitmentGood
safe: Using medicines safelyGood
safe: Preventing and controlling infectionGood
caring: Ensuring people are well treated and supported; respecting equality and diversityOutstanding
caring: Respecting and promoting people's privacy, dignity and independence; Supporting people to express their viewsOutstanding
well-led: Promoting a positive culture that is person-centred, open, inclusive and empoweringOutstanding
well-led: Continuous learning and improving care; Working in partnership with othersOutstanding
well-led: Managers and staff being clear about their roles, and understanding quality performance, risks and regulatory requirementsOutstanding
well-led: Engaging and involving people using the service, the public and staff, fully considering their equality characteristicsOutstanding