Community Health Care- Our commitment to Clinical Governance and Risk Management

PULSE has robust governance and risk management processes in place. These processes are designed to ensure where PULSE manage clients in the community they are safe and our carers are trained and competent to deliver the care required.

PULSE takes all appropriate and reasonable action to minimise risk and and an overview of the steps we take is given below:

• PULSE undertakes a full risk assessment, which covers the care, environment and manual handling and provides detailed care plans for each client.
• Every carer allocated to a client undergoes formal training in relevant complex care prior to working with the client, which includes ventilators, tracheostomy, suctioning, PEG feeding, medicines management etc.
• Where a particular diagnosis is made, for example epilepsy, specialist training is also given appropriate to that condition.
• PULSE carers are assessed as competent by competent a registered practitioner prior to commencing work.
• Wherever possible PULSE will arrange ‘shadow shifts’ for the carer supervised by NHS staff and within the NHS organisation, with the client prior to the client being transferred into our care.
• We work closely with the multi-disciplinary team of people providing care to each client to ensure effective communication.

Each client and PULSE carers is reviewed on a fortnightly basis to ensure the care delivered remains appropriate and safe.

PULSE operates a very high quality service underpinned by rigorous clinical governance:

• All incidents and complaints are recorded and managed using our Datix risk management system and are investigated according to our procedures.
• Our Clinical Governance Committee reviews all incidents and complaints on a monthly business to ensure we act appropriately and learn from the lessons identified.
• We are open and transparent in our approach and involve all relevant parties in the governance process and we are happy to share these procedures with clients and commissioners in detail.

We consistently welcome any feedback and encourage our commissioners and clients to voice any concerns they have at any time.