A Case Study by Kayleigh White.
The Complexities of Care in a changing market: Reflections from the UPL Care Team
An Introduction to Kayleigh.
With more than 25 years of experience in health and social care, Kayleigh possesses exceptional expertise in leadership and service delivery. She heads the care and support team, managing referrals, coordinating services with external providers, and assisting clients in hiring personal assistants to meet their care requirements. Kayleigh also conducts audits and addresses care-related concerns alongside clients and case managers, while developing essential systems and documentation for Unite Professionals’ care and support sectors. In her free time, Kayleigh loves to relax at home with her family, friends, and her Chihuahua, Joey!
Insights from the Unite Professionals Care Team.
In my role at UPL, Senior Care Coordinator, one core task we complete is the due diligence on the Care Providers we commission for our clients.
I attended a seminar recently, where the lead speaker was the chief inspector of Care Inspectorate Wales, discussing the biggest downfall to their inspections and current annual report. The main outcome was the fact management and leadership came from people who had no knowledge of what is needed to ensure safe systems, person centred care and safe employment of their staff teams ensuring delivering safe care and treatment.
We and others in the Health and Social care teams are seeing more members of the public set up care companies where the appointed persons had no experience in delivering care, no evidential education such as health-care and leadership NVQs and mostly no experience of use for safe systems and auditing the company’s compliance to ensure SAFE and WELL-LED practices.
The complexity of managing a care support system and who you are governed by is
simply a case of deciding if your company provide the term ‘Personal Care’. If not then these companies will not be governed leading to poor practice and even at last resort death of a client!
| CQC Registered Care Providers/Management | Unregistered Providers/Management |
|---|---|
| Trained, experienced appointed management members. | Autocratic leadership – winning at all costs. |
| Core systems and auditing in action. | Overly competitive – higher hourly rate. |
| Policies and procedures in place. | Authoritarian decision making. |
| Experienced safeguarding processes in place. | Toxic work environment. |
| Care documents already developed and implemented for clients and staff. | Ethical violations leading to illegal decision making. |
| Knowledge of MCA and decision-making with local authority MDT teams. | Legal and financial repercussions. |
| Commissioned hours delivered with contracted staff and full shift coverage. | Unsafe working environments. |
| Transparency between company, regulators, and clients. | Emotional and moral damage to the client. |
| All staff follow CQC Quality Statements. | Receiving unfactual daily care notes, detrimenting the care package. |
Casse Study
The Mid Staffordshire NHS scandal remains one of the most powerful examples of how Poor Leadership can have devastating consequences in Health and Social care.