Tony Carlin’s Compliance Diary – Day Four
Day Four of Tony Carlin’s Compliance Diary
Today it’s Well Led: Governance, Leadership and Culture – hugely topical in the current health and social care sector. The stunningly beautiful London Golf Club in sunny Kent is the beautiful backdrop for my delegates made up mainly from the social care sector and acute NHS services. Today’s theme linking in to this is choice and control, and how mental capacity is managed in these areas.
All adults are presumed to have sufficient capacity to decide on their own medical treatment, unless there’s significant evidence to suggest otherwise. Capacity means the ability to use and understand information to make a decision, and communicate any decision made. A person lacks capacity if their mind is impaired or disturbed in some way, which means they’re unable to make a decision at that time. If someone makes a decision about treatment that other people would consider to be irrational, it does not necessarily mean they have a lack of capacity, as long as they understand the reality of their situation.
How we, as providers, promote choice and control, and train and support our teams to both understand and respect people’s rights to make choices, is a big determination in how we will be rated by the CQC, even more so now under the pending new single assessment framework.
The two quality statements below are just two of the numerous new standards that strongly focus on the individual and what they want, instead of what we as care providers believe they should have.
1) Involving people to manage risks
We work with people to understand and manage risks by thinking holistically so that care meets their needs in a way that is safe and supportive and enables them to do the things that matter to them.
2) Independence, choice and control
We promote people’s independence, so they know their rights and have choice and control over their own care, treatment and well-being.
At our workshops, we really drill into how Leadership teams are vital in driving and embedding this culture and look at how to evidence this to prove you’re delivering outstanding, person-centered care.
