Welcome to APASENTH Home and Community Services. This guide summarises basic information about APASENTH Home & Community Services for users of our service, people who are considering using our service, and the friends, relatives, carers and representatives of users and potential users. It includes the material required by the Domiciliary Care Agencies Regulations 2002.
We will provide you with the assistance you need as detailed in your Care Plan. This has been drawn up and agreed with you, following an assessment of need by a team member of APASENTH Home & Community Services.
Aims & Objectives
To provide advice and relief of Asian and particularly Bangladeshi children and young people with learning disabilities and their parents/carers who reside in Tower Hamlets.
To establish and maintain a centre for children and young adults with special needs and for their parents/carers to improve the quality of their lives.
To provide welfare rights advice/counselling, information, advocacy, care and recreational services, health promotion, employment support and training courses for young adults with learning difficulties & moderate disabilities.
To organise and conduct parents’ group sessions, tasks, and lectures of professional expertise with the aim of providing education to parents with children of special need. Particularly to improve the health and education of such children.
To provide access to isolated carers and raise awareness of the benefits that is not available to those people with disabilities.
To acquire bigger premises to accommodate all the existing and potential project to provide the target groups easy access to extensive support and quality services.
To exercise a responsibility influence on the development of social policies and services, both locally and nationally.
To provide a comprehensive and effective welfare rights service to the disabled groups and their parents of Asian origin in Tower Hamlets, which is independent, free, confidential and impartial regardless of gender, sexuality or extent of disability.
To provide training courses and employment support for improving everyday life-skills and quality of life.
To raise the awareness of promoting home-school partnership and to work closely with special schools including mainstream schools.
To work in partnership with other statutory and voluntary organisation on health promotion and welfare services.
Our Philosophy
APASENTH Home & Community Services is committed to meeting the expectations of the 1990 Community Care Act and the 2002 National Minimum Standards for Domiciliary Care. We are committed to identifying and meeting the individual needs of our service users.
The Organisation is committed to the principles of empowerment and enabling which protect and promote the rights, choices, privacy, dignity and independence of all its service users regardless of age, disability, gender, ethnic origin, nationality or sexual orientation.
Central to the fulfilment of the organisation's philosophy is the investment of sufficient resources into the training and development of its staff. We believe that only through this investment can APASENTH Home & Community Services attain the levels of competence and commitment demanded of its care staff and management across the range of services provided.
APASENTH Home & Community Services believes in the importance of teamwork in the provision of high quality care support services. The organisation will work to establish and foster strong links of co-operation between its co-ordinators, service users, purchasers and other interested parties.
Our Principles
To focus on service users. We aim to provide personal care and support in ways which have positive outcomes for service users and promote their active participation.
To ensure that we are fit for our purpose. We examine our operations constantly to ensure that we are successfully achieving our stated aims and purposes. We welcome feedback from our service users and their friends and relatives.
To work for the comprehensive welfare of our service users. We aim to provide for each service user a package of care that contributes to his or her overall personal and healthcare needs and preferences. We will co-operate with other services and professionals to help to maximise each service user’s independence and to ensure as fully as possible the services user’s maximum participation in the community.
To meet assessed needs. Before we provide services, we ensure that a potential service user’s needs and preferences are thoroughly assessed. We aim to ensure that the care the agency provides meets the assessed needs of each service user, that needs are re-assessed as frequently as necessary, and that the care and support provided have the flexibility to respond to changing needs or requirements.
To provide quality services. We are whole-heartedly committed to providing top quality services and to continuous improvement in the level of the care we offer.
To employ a quality workforce. Standards for our managers and staff are based on the national occupational standards for the care industry set by the National Training Organisation.
Management Team
Director Manager Coordinator Senior Support Officer Quality Control Officer Contract & Finance Training & Development
Service User’s Rights
The aim of good quality domiciliary care must always be to promote a way of life for service users which permits them to enjoy, to the greatest possible extent, their rights as individual human beings. The following rights are fundamental to our agency’s work.
Privacy
An individual’s right to privacy involves being free from intrusion or unwelcome attention. We aim to maximise our service users’ privacy in the following ways.
Staff will enter a service user’s property and rooms within the property only with express consent.
A service user has the right not to have to interact with or be interrupted by a worker when, for example, they are entertaining a visitor or are engaged on an intimate activity on their own account.
We respect the fact that a service user’s possessions are private and always act in accordance with the principle that our workers are guests.
Our staffs respect a service user’s right to make telephone calls and carry on conversations without being overheard or observed by a worker.
We ensure that records of the service provided are seen only by those with a legitimate need to know the information they contain.
Dignity
The right to dignity involves recognising the intrinsic value of people as individuals and the specific nature of each person’s particular needs. We aim to maximise our service users’ dignity in the following ways.
We arrange for service users who require assistance with bodily tasks such as dressing, bathing and toileting to be helped as far as possible by the care worker of their own choice and, if desired, of the sex of their choice.
We ensure if asked that service users receive the necessary assistance with dressing and maintaining their clothes.
We will try to provide help for service users with make-up, manicure, hairdressing and other elements of their appearance so that they can present themselves as they would wish.
We aim to minimise any feelings of inadequacy, inferiority and vulnerability which service users’ may have arising from disability.
We treat service users with the sort of respect which reinforces personhood and individual characteristics, addressing them and introducing them to others in their preferred style, responding to specific cultural demands and requirements, and aiming to maintain relationships which are warm and trusting but appropriate to the relationship of worker to service user.
Independence
Independence means having opportunities to think, plan, act and take sensibly calculated risks without continual reference to others. We aim to maximise our service users’ independence in the following ways.
We help service users to manage for themselves where possible rather than becoming totally dependent on care workers and others.
We encourage service users to take as much responsibility as possible for their own healthcare and medication.
We involve service users fully in planning their own care, devising and implementing their care plans and managing the records of care.
We work with carers, relatives and friends of service users to provide as continuous a service as is feasible.
We aim to create a climate in the delivery of care and to foster attitudes in those around a service user which focus on capacities rather than on disabilities.
Security
In providing services to people with disabilities, there is a difficult balance to be struck between helping them to experience as much independence as possible and making sure that they are not exposed to unnecessary hazards. Taking care for the security of service users therefore means helping to provide an environment and support structure which offers sensible protection from danger and comfort and readily available assistance when required. This should not be interpreted as a demand for a totally safe or risk-free lifestyle; taking reasonable risks can be interesting, exciting and fun, as well as necessary. We respond to our service users’ need for security in the following ways.
We try to make sure that help is tactfully at hand when a service user needs or wishes to engage in any activity which places them in situations of substantial risk.
We hope to help to create a physical environment which is free from unnecessary sources of danger to vulnerable people or their property.
We always carry out thorough risk assessments in relation to premises, equipment and the activities of the service user who is being helped.
Our staff will advise service users about situations or activities in which their disability is likely to put them or their property at risk.
The staffs of our agency are well selected, trained and briefed to provide services responsibly, professionally and with compassion and never to exploit their positions to abuse a service user.
Civil rights
We aim to help our service users to continue to enjoy their civil rights in the following ways.
If service users wish to participate in elections, we will try to access the necessary information and either provide or obtain any assistance which they need to vote.
We want to help our service users to make use of as wide a range as possible of public services, such as libraries, education and transport.
We will encourage our service users to make full use of health services in all ways appropriate to their medical, nursing and therapeutic needs.
We will provide easy access for our service users and their friends, relatives and representatives to complain about or give feedback on our services.
If we can, we will support our service users in their participating as fully and diversely as they wish in the activities of their communities through voluntary work, religious observance, involvement in associations and charitable giving.
Choice
Choice consists of the opportunity to select independently from a range of options. We will respond to our service users’ right to choice in the following ways.
We avoid a pattern of service delivery which leads to compulsory timings for activities like getting up and going to bed.
We will manage and schedule our services so as to respond as far as possible to service users’ preferences as regards the staff with whom they feel most comfortable.
We respect service users’ eccentricities, personal preferences and idiosyncrasies.
We hope to cultivate an atmosphere and ethos in our service delivery which welcomes and responds to cultural diversity.
We encourage service users to exercise informed choice in their selection of the organisation and individuals who provide them with assistance.
Fulfilment
Fulfilment has been defined as the opportunity to realise personal aspirations and abilities. It recognises and responds to levels of human satisfaction separate from the physical and material, but it is difficult to generalise about fulfilment since it deals with precisely those areas of lifestyle where individuals differ from each other. We respond to service users’ right to fulfilment in the following ways.
We try to help service users to participate in as broad a range of social and cultural activities as possible.
If requested, we will assist a service user to participate in practices associated with religious or spiritual matters and to celebrate meaningful anniversaries and festivals.
We aim to respond sensitively and appropriately to the special needs and wishes of service users who wish to prepare for or are close to death.
We make particular efforts to understand and respond to the wish of any service user to participate in minority-interest events or activities.
We will do everything possible to help a service user who wants to achieve an unfulfilled task, wish or ambition before the end of their life.
Diversity
Britain’s social care services are used by people from a wide diversity of ethnic and cultural backgrounds. Services therefore need to be accessible. We need to make particular efforts to reach out to vulnerable people who might have been deterred from approaching agencies which appear not to relate to their special needs and aspirations, and to demonstrate that we welcome and celebrate the wide range of people in the community generally and among the users of services in particular. We respond to service users’ right to express their diversity in the following ways.
Positively communicating to our service users that their diverse backgrounds enhance the life of the community.
Respecting the ethnic, cultural and religious practices of service users.
Outlawing negatively discriminatory behaviour by staff and others.
Accommodating individual differences without censure.
Helping service users to celebrate events, anniversaries and festivals which are important to them.
Flexibility
APASENTH Home & Community Services realises that life just isn’t always simple. Life changes, circumstances change, need change. While we make sure your expectations are met right from the start, we are flexible and adaptable enough to make it easy for you to tell us how to care for you. Any changes you need will be dealt with quickly, efficiently and we’ll do our best to make it worry free for you. You, our client, mean everything to us.
Services We Provide
These are just some of the services we provide. Do not hesitate to contact us with any queries regarding your hesitation; we’re confident that we can help.
Personal care such as bathing and dressing
Getting up
Put to bed
Assistance with administration of medication
Provide a trained staff to administer medication
Collect pensions, paying bills
Prepare meals
Live-in care
Sitting service – day or night
Supported living service
Domestic duties such as cleaning, laundry, vacuuming
Shopping
Learning Disabilities Outreach service
Who we care for
children and their families
people with learning disabilities
older people
people with mental health problems
people with physical disabilities
people with sensory loss, including those with dual sensory impairment
people who are terminally ill
personal or family carers.
People who require care after stay in hospital
Range of Services
We provide various ranges of services in the community across the borough of Tower Hamlets and other neighbouring Boroughs.
Children & Families: As the organisation has grown, APASENTH HOME & COMMUNITY CARE has been able to expand the range of specialist services it can offer to its service users. Supporting certain vulnerable families need to ensure that their children are able to grow up in an environment where they are well looked after. Children with disability who requires help and support with personal care in the morning and afternoon assisting the family for their children going to the school.
Learning Disabilities Support: APASENTH HOME & COMMUNITY CARE operates a number of contracts specialising in supporting children and adults with learning disabilities. Our trained support staffs provides a range of services from personal care, escorting service users to and from daycentres or clubs providing some respite to the parents and other carers living with the daily challenges of caring for a child/adult with challenging behaviour.
Care for the Elderly: Care Staffs visit many elderly people in their homes to assist with essential daily living tasks ranging from shopping and cleaning to washing, changing sanitary wear and assisting to use the toilet. Typically, a care worker will visit several service users in succession every morning (and/or lunchtime or evening) and assist them to get up and prepare for the day. Once or twice a week, there may be some shopping to do or benefits to collect on behalf of the service user.
Mental Health Support: Although the bulk of our work is with children and Learning Disability Peoples, APASENTH HOME & COMMUNITY CARE s also has a number of specialist contracts to provide support for people with mental health problems who are living in the community. Typically, support workers will assist a service user in aspects of their daily living that they may find challenging, difficult or impossible. This may mean accompanying a person to a day centre or classes or helping with shopping, cleaning or washing clothes. Shifts tend to be longer in duration than for elderly personal care.
Domestic Services: APASENTH HOME & COMMUNITY CARE provides staff to assist with housework, shopping etc. both as a standalone service to the elderly and disabled and as a supplementary service as part of a larger package of personal care.
Our Pledge to you
We will be available to you 24 hours a day every day of the year
We will ensure our Carers and support workers are carefully selected and CRB checked and receive ongoing training
We will regular check and monitor the service you are receiving to ensure the highest possible standard is provided
We will ensure that our clients are able to make real choices and have control over their care plan
We will make sure your view and opinions about the service you require taken seriously
We will ensure our office staffs, care assistants and support workers are courteous and respectful and professional to your needs at all times
We will continually aim to exceed the high standards of care and business practice set by the Care Quality Commission (CQC)
How we Deliver Care
Initial referral
When you realised that you needed care you may have approached APASENTH Home & Community Services direct; alternatively, you may have been referred to us by the social services department from which you initially sought help and which has accepted at least some financial responsibility. In either case, information about you which is passed to us will be dealt with sensitively and in confidence. Before providing any services we will need to talk with you as the person who is going to be receiving the service, perhaps with your carer if there is one, and with the social services department which contacted us. At the very outset we need to be sure that the services we provide are going to be suitable for you.
Assessing the need
If someone comes to us from a social services department, the local authority care manager will have carried out an assessment of what you need before deciding that domiciliary care, that is a care service delivered to your own home, is going to meet your needs. A summary of this information, usually called a needs assessment, will have been passed to us. If you have approached us direct, we need to make an assessment ourselves. To do this we will need to ask you quite a lot of questions, and probably to seek information from your carer, your doctor, and any other specialists who know about your health and needs. The assessment will be carried out by specially trained staff. We hope that you do not find the process by which we get to know your needs too intrusive. We want to build up a full picture and we will do this as quickly and tactfully as possible. Remember, all the information will be treated confidentially. Our aim is always to make sure that we understand what you need and what your preferences are about services, so that we can respond in ways which really suit you.
Assessing the risks
If you have decided to have care provided in your own home, you will know of course that that carries some risk. The care worker is unlikely to be with you all the time so there will not be the same level of support as you would receive in, for example, a residential home. On the other hand you retain your independence and many people find that, on balance, a measure of risk is worthwhile. Nevertheless, we want to be sure that everybody concerned understands the risks and has thought about them responsibly and that the risks to be taken are not unreasonable or unnecessary. So, with you, we carry out a risk assessment, weighing up the risks to be taken with the advantages, and if it seems appropriate we might make suggestions as to how unnecessary risks can be minimised.
Service User Plan
Having assessed your needs and the risks in the situation, we then — again with help from you and your carer — prepare a plan for the care we expect to deliver. This is called the Service User Plan because you as the service user really are central to it. It will specify the services we will provide, with details like timings of care worker visits and the special tasks to be performed, and will state what we all hope to be the objectives of providing the service and how we plan to achieve those objectives.
Reassessing the need and reviewing the care
Of course, over time your needs may change. You may need more or less care, the type or pattern of service may have to be varied, new risks may become apparent. So, again with your help, we will keep your needs under review and take decisions about the care accordingly. If at any time there are aspects about the care which you would like to change, let us know.
Terms, Conditions and Fees
Service users who have been referred through a social services department, usually the fees will be covered by the local authority. For any individual bodies or person requesting our service directly, the fee may vary according to the service requirement as they fall in to the care need categories. For further information contact APASENTH HOME & COMMUNITY SERVICES and speak to the manager.
Quality Assurance
We are always keen to provide the best possible service and to do this we continually check on what we are doing, talk with our staff and with outsiders who have opportunities to see and judge our work, and above all listen to our customers. This process is called quality assurance. It involves:
an annual visit to all service users by a supervisor or a manager to hear your views at first hand
regular supervision meetings between each care worker and their line manager
an annual survey of service users, and where appropriate their relatives or representatives, to obtain views and opinions
careful checks on all service user files, timesheets and other records.
In addition to these opportunities, please feel free to let us have your views at any time. We need to know how we are doing, and you are best placed to tell us.
How APASENTH meets the high standards
Our carers are carefully selected, interviewed, inducted and possess all relevant training required by the standard
Our staff possess or are undertaking a minimum level 2 NVQ , NVQ 3 and other accredited qualifications
We regularly monitor and review our carers, support staff and office staffs, through telephone surveys, customer satisfaction questionnaires and random assessments
We deal with issues raised quickly, sympathetically and professionally with the least disruption to you.
APASENTH Home & Community Services strives to provide the care that you need in the way that you want it. Talk to us about any suggestions, comments or even complaints that you may have or indeed if you just want to find out more about our services.
Our Policies and Procedures
What are policies and procedures?
Running a domiciliary care agency poses a variety of issues to be resolved, for service users, staff and managers. To be sure that we behave consistently, to capture good practice and to keep everybody informed of how the agency works, we have written down where we stand on certain key matters and how we handle certain frequently recurring situations. These are our policies and procedures. Together they form quite a long list. Service users are welcome to examine any of these documents and to have a copy of their own if they wish.
Areas covered
Our policies and procedures cover the areas:
statement of purpose, with the aims and objectives of the organisation
conditions of engagement for staff
staff contracts and job descriptions
range of activities undertaken and the limits of responsibility
personal safety for staff at work
quality assurance system
confidentiality of information
non-discriminatory practice
equal opportunities, including our response to sexual or racial harassment
health and safety
moving and handling
dealing with accidents and emergencies
dealing with abuse and bad practice
data protection and access to records by service users
assisting with medication
handling money and financial matters on behalf of a service user
maintaining the records in the home
gifts and legacies made by service users
dealing with violence and aggression
entering and leaving the service user’s home
safe keeping of keys
complaints and compliments
staff discipline and grievances
training and staff development.
The organisation’s care workers
We recognise that for most service users the most important people in our organisation are the care and support workers with whom service users will have regular contact. We take great care in recruiting, training and supervising our staff. We recognise that for most service users the most important people in our organisation are the care and support workers with whom service users will have regular contact. We take great care in recruiting, training and supervising our staff.
Our staffs have a wide range of qualifications. All our care workers are introduced with Skills for Care Common Induction (CIS). The CIS induction period enable care workers to give high quality care and support, It also provides recognition for their work, and prepares them for entry onto NVQ health and social care programmes. Other training and refreshers are also maintained continuously with all care staffs.
There are six Common Induction Standards:
understanding principles of care
understanding the organisation and role of the worker
maintaining safety at work
communicating effectively
recognising and responding to abuse and neglect
developing as a worker.
Each standard contains a number of areas of knowledge that care workers need to know about before they can work unsupervised. The CIS provide a structured start for new care staff. A structured start, alongside opportunities for professional development, plays an important part in improved staff retention. New workers in services supporting people with learning disabilities are now required to use the Learning Disability Induction Award. The award covers all the areas required by the Common Induction Standards, with a learning disability orientation.
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