Carleton House

We found the following examples of good practice. ● The service supports people with severe enduring mental health problems; with some people who had experienced heighted levels of anxiety across the pandemic. A number of people were at high risk of self- harming. The pandemic had presented real challenges to this client group and the provider had responded in a variety of innovative ways. They had newly created the role of COVID-19 Champion and employed an additional support worker for this. The COVID-19 Champion's role was to support people to still access the community in a safe way. The champion gave one to one support, reassured people, reminded people about wearing masks and helped to encourage social distancing and hand-washing. Some people had been able to have successful trips to the shops, to go out for exercise and take part in permitted activities. ● The COVID-19 Champion also risk assessed venues for compliance with COVID-19 safe rules prior to taking people out. This had helped to reduce people's level of anxiety. The champion carried out a COVID-19 risk assessment for the local adult education class one resident had previously been attending prior to lockdown. The champion was able to give advice to the venue about safe practices and additional measures. This meant the person could then safely attend the class and their anxiety levels were much reduced knowing the venue had been checked. ● For those people in the clinically extremely vulnerable group the home had set up a 'Pop Up Shop' within the home. This was to give people choice and to retain some level of independence when the rules were that they were not to go out. A book club had also been set up using the local library and the COVID-19 Champion and those who could go out selected books to bring back to the home. This had also led onto a developing a music club. These were all ideas and measures to promote people's mental well-being. ● The service had a large smart screen TV and computer for use in helping service users connect with social media and had been used for COVID-19 awareness training with both staff and residents. Laptops, video calls and roaming phones have been used in contacting relatives or professionals. ● The provider had been proactive in identifying the risks from COVID-19. This had included the early introduction of enhanced support to ensure safe visiting to the service. They had also purchased additional personal protective equipment, (PPE), before the national disruption of supplies. ● The service had set up an infection control (IPC) station in the entrance way so all visitors could be monitored and risk assessed. This included a declaration and a digital temperature check. All goods and supplies into the home was taken through the attached garage so they could be appropriately decontaminated.

Further information is in the detailed findings below.

The five questions we ask about services and what we found