Meeting documents

To receive the Performance report.

The Committee considered a report on the performance of Adult Social Care.  Key achievements were the focus on managing demand, improving outcomes and improving the number of calls to Somerset Direct that are resolved at the first point of contact. This target for this is 60% and has been over that for the first part of 2019 at 62.5% for February. Somerset County Council’s Customer Service team was awarded the best customer service contact centre award in a South West Forum.

There have been improvements in performance of the localities team with overdue assessment s being reduced by 89% and aa average completion time down from 53 days to 18 days.

The Home First initiative has supported independence and reduced the need for longer term stay in hospital. As this service has developed over the past year it has grown and now on average 75 people are being discharged earlier from hospital onto a Home First pathway to be supported at home.

The Committee were please to hear that there is an upward trend in the CQC rating for Somerset Care Homes with 92%% of providers being Good or Outstanding in February 2019.

The Committee were interested the inspection of Care Homes. These are formally inspected on a quarterly basis but as healthcare professional visited daily any concerns would be raised appropriately. The quality of the food on offer was questioned. The Committee was assured that all meals are nutritional and balanced but there is also an element of personal choice which is not denied.

The Committee were interested in the challenges for the coming year and they were informed that they continue to be staffing and the reliance on costly Agency Staffing. It was acknowledged that there continues to be a desire to ‘grown our own talent’ and that some providers are currently offering golden handshakes, and this has the potential to exacerbate the problem.