Supporting adult care providers with compliance – an interview with Inspired for Health

We spoke to Georgina Turner, founder of Inspired for Health, about her career and how her company has adapted to the current pandemic. Inspired for Health provide training, one to one support and advice on adult social care compliance. 

Georgina Turner, founder of Inspired for Health

Starting in care

From the age of 16, I worked in several care homes, where I started as a domestic then I went on to be a care assistant.  

I then went on to train as a Nurse in Liverpool. After my training I covered many specialist areas to gain as much experience as I could. I worked within; acute medicine, district nursing, nursing homes, domiciliary care, children’s complex need community services and more.  

I always had a keen interest in medical law so I then studied for a Law Degree and Law Masters which supported my transition into NHS clinic governance and compliance.  

The beginnings of Inspired for Health

I now work for the NHS as a Healthcare Quality Programme Manager as well as working for the CQC as a specialist professional advisor for nursing homes and domiciliary care. I decided to set up Inspired for Health to offer more support to adult care providers with continuous quality improvement and compliance. We carry out compliance reviews, cultural reviews, one to one Registered Manager support as well as providing training on regulations, quality, audit and compliance.  

Pre-COVID, we visited our customers on site to provide tailored support with their CQC compliance. This helped us to observe the environment, examine compliance documentation and understand how the care and support was provided. 

An important part of the process we went through included taking groups of staff off site to ask questions anonymously in a supportive environment as part of our cultural review. This enabled teams to reflect on their workplace experience and speak openly about the culture and processes within their organization. I could then pass on their anonymous feedback and suggestions to management without breaching their confidentiality. This gave organisations a deeper and more honest insight into how their teams were feeling and if any of their working practices were having a negative impact and were in need of appropriate change.  

Adapting to COVID

As with all organisations in adult social care, Inspired for Health had to quickly adapt to changes in working due to the pandemic. We now complete our compliance reviews virtually. We also offer cost effective online training, as well as free events where providers can share lessons learned and tips for good practice in areas such as Safe and Well Led. I think it’s important for the care community to come together to offer each other support in these stressful times and to discuss best practice in a safe, caring environment. 

Georgina’s advice

There is an important need to share provider data safely and securely. However, for some paper-based providers this can be more difficult as scanning documents and sending secure emails can be time consuming. This is especially so if they do not have their compliance and care information stored digitally.  

Even in the current climate, care providers need to always be ready for a focused or comprehensive inspection. From recent consultation documents, it appears that the CQC are keen to utilise secure data and feedback from service user experiences when providing compliance ratings.  

For any new clients, I always recommend seriously considering an investment in the latest technology to evidence CQC compliance. However, it’s important to ensure that you always seek ‘word of mouth’ feedback from other providers and ask for a software demonstration. The right software can do wonders for both quality improvement and business efficiency.  

Some of the things I really like about Radar Healthcare is the ability to evidence compliance data in one safe, yet accessible place and being able to attach detailed evidence, documents and photographs. It also helps to provide an effective audit trail to ensure that all actions are appropriately allocated, actioned, monitored and completed on time. This should enable teams to provide a well led and safe service for all. 

See more about Inspired for Health, or connect with Georgina on LinkedIn.