What is the CQC?
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is England's independent regulator of health and adult social care. They inspect care homes against a set of standards and publish ratings — Outstanding, Good, Requires Improvement, or Inadequate — that directly affect a home's reputation and commercial viability.
The Single Assessment Framework
Introduced in 2023, the Single Assessment Framework (SAF) replaced the previous Key Lines of Enquiry (KLOEs). It centres on five key questions that every inspection answers:
Safe
Are people protected from abuse, avoidable harm, and poor practice?
Effective
Is care evidence-based and achieving good outcomes for people?
Caring
Are staff compassionate, respectful, and treating people with dignity?
Responsive
Is care person-centred and flexible to people's changing needs?
Well-led
Is the service well-managed, learning, and continuously improving?
The 34 quality statements
Each key question breaks down into quality statements — 34 in total. Each statement describes what good care looks like from the perspective of the people who use services. CQC collects evidence against each statement from observations, staff interviews, records, and what residents and families tell them.
Safe
- Learning culture
- Safe systems, pathways & transitions
- Safeguarding
- Involving people in managing risks
- Safe environments
- Safe and effective staffing
- Infection prevention & control
- Medicines optimisation
Effective
- Assessing needs
- Delivering evidence-based care & treatment
- How staff, teams and services work together
- Supporting people to live healthier lives
- Monitoring and improving outcomes
- Consent to care and treatment
Caring
- Kindness, compassion and dignity
- Treating people as individuals
- Independence, choice and control
- Responding to people's immediate needs
- Workforce wellbeing & enablement
Responsive
- Person-centred care
- Care provision, integration and continuity
- Providing information
- Listening to and involving people
- Equity in access
- Equity in experiences and outcomes
- Planning for the future
Well-led
- Shared direction and culture
- Capable, compassionate and inclusive leaders
- Freedom to speak up
- Workforce equality, diversity and inclusion
- Governance, management and sustainability
- Partnerships and communities
- Learning, improvement and innovation
How CareDeck helps
CareDeck is built around the SAF. Every feature maps to one or more quality statements, so you always know where your evidence is — and where the gaps are.
Resident care plans
8 holistic sections covering personal profile, physical health, emotional needs, social needs, communication, consent & capacity, goals, and end of life planning. Each section generates auditable, timestamped evidence.
Medication management
Electronic MAR charts with administration records, PRN protocols, controlled drug logs, and alert flags for missed doses.
Incident & accident logs
Timestamped, audit-trailed records with root-cause analysis prompts, notification workflows, and links to care plan updates.
Handover & shift notes
Structured shift logs that create a continuous, searchable care record — exactly what CQC inspectors ask to see.
CQC readiness dashboard
Live RAG status across all 34 quality statements, surfacing gaps before an inspection rather than during one.