What you need to know about …the Care Quality Commission
What is the Care Quality Commission?
From April 2009, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the new regulator of health and social care in England. It has taken over the work of the Commission for Social Care Inspection (CSCI), the Healthcare Commission and the Mental Health Act Commission.
It has around 2,500 staff working across the country. The aim of the new Commission is to provide a single contact point for service users, families and carers for information on standards, safety and available provision, and to bring together statistical information about services with the views of service users and staff. The CQC also say they will give "an independent, authoritative view on the contribution that care makes to preventing illness and promoting ongoing healthy, independent living and wellbeing".
What will change and when will it happen?
For the first year, the replacement of CSCI by the new Commission should make no difference to the way our services are registered and inspected. But from April 2010 new inspection and registration standards will be introduced under the Social Care Act 2008. Services already registered with CSCI will need to re-register, and there is likely to be a charge for this. From April 2010 there will be a new inspection regime however the new standards for inspection have not yet been agreed. The Department of Health have said that for providers there will be "a much clearer system of exactly which requirements they must meet in order to provide services. The risk-based approach means that regulation activity will be targeted where action is required".
How is United Response doing so far?
All registered services delivered by United Response meet the Department of Health's National Minimum Standards. They are regulated and inspected by the Care Quality Commission; following a key inspection, each service is awarded a quality rating ranging from 0 stars (poor), 1 star (adequate), 2 stars (good) to 3 stars (excellent). 85% of United Response services are currently rated as "Good" or "Excellent", with no services rated as less than "adequate". We also meet the Supporting People Quality Assessment Framework (QAF) core and supplementary objectives.