QUALITY ASSURANCE | empowered-lives

Quality Assurance

Empowered Lives Limited operates a robust quality assurance process and the purpose of which is:

to effectively monitor the service it provides to service users
to effectively monitor the support it provides to employees
to establish the opinions and thoughts on the services provided as perceived by service users, employees, stakeholders and other interested 3rd parties
to gather information in a productive manner on a wide range of subjects pertaining to the delivery of service
to use all feedback in positive way to continually improve the delivery of the service

In order to complete the audits necessary to evaluate our service Empowered Lives Limited commits to:

Promoting awareness to service users of the Quality Assurance policy
Educating key employees of the importance of identifying the need for and promoting the policy to the remaining staff team
Simplifying accessibility to the policy for interested parties

Empowered Lives Limited relies upon effective communication and feedback from:

Service users
Employees
Stakeholders and other interested 3rd parties

Empowered Lives Limited is also mindful of balancing the need to satisfy our own need to gather data with that of the service users right to privacy.

Therefore we maximise our opportunity to solicit views by using a range of approaches.

Approaches to Gathering Quality Assurance

Empowered Lives Limited uses a range of approaches to establish the quality of the service to include:-

Annual Quality Assurance Questionnaires
Supervision
Compliments
Complaints
Comments
Review meetings
Benchmarking best practice
Independent audit / review by external consultant
CQC review
Monitoring visits
Completion of CQC Provider Compliance Assessment Forms as a self audit tool

Governance

Empowered Lives Bases it Governance Ethos on the The National Quality Board 2011 which describe the responsibilities for quality as being threefold:

to ensure that the Fundamental Standards of Quality and Safety (as determined by CQC’s registration requirements) are at a minimum being met.
to ensure that the organisation is striving for continuous quality improvement and outcomes; and
to ensure that every member of staff that has contact with patients, or whose actions directly impact on patient care, is motivated and enabled to deliver effective, safe and person‐centred care

Empowered Lives will create a culture within the organisation that enables staff to work at their best, and to have in place arrangements for measuring and monitoring quality and for escalating issues. We will encourage a culture where services are improved by learning from mistakes, and staff and service users are encouraged to identify areas for improvement, and not be afraid to speak out.

Our Corporate Quality Governance structures and processes provide assurance to those who use services that we ensure the service delivery contributes positively to the experience of service users and the staff who work within our services.

The structures and processes that are in place to monitor and improve the organisations quality performance includes:

Making sure that required standards are achieved and ultimately exceeded
Where shortfalls are evident, action follows to improve performance
Setting out quality improvement plans that meet and exceed customer expectations
The improvement in the quality of clinical activities and care interventions.
Identification of best practice and sharing learning opportunities
Being clear about the risk factors that impact on the delivery of quality care and taking steps to reduce and eliminate them

Organisational learning is essential to providing future safe service delivery. Empowered Lives has a defined and systematic approach to the investigating and learning from incidents and analysis of events. This enhances the development of risk assessment and management frameworks within individual services and the corporate structure. A culture of openness and learning is fostered and encouraged and underpins transparent and open working practices.

We recognise that it is important that all staff are actively engaged in continually improving the quality of care for service users. The effective implementation of quality governance is best achieved if staff at all levels within the organisation are involved, encouraged and supported to participate in activities to improve care delivery.

In order to engage all staff the following is required:

Strong leadership to ensure understanding of the aims and purpose of quality governance
Corporate and service user level quality governance committee
Proportionate responses to incidents
A culture of no blame but personal accountability
The organisation learns from experience
Recognition for good practice
A culture that encourages and supports learning and development
Clear systems and processes for quality governance and clinical audit
Robust and timely information on quality governance activities