How do the values of care, service-user rights and anti-discriminatory practice combine to deliver quality care?
Overview of AS 1 Promoting Quality Care: the values of care and care value base, the rights of service users, the responsibilities of care workers, how quality care is promoted and the barriers that discrimination and abuse of power create.
An overview of the internally assessed CCEA AS 1 Promoting Quality Care unit: the values of care, the rights of service users, the responsibilities of care workers, and how anti-discriminatory practice and the redress of power imbalances promote quality care in health, social care and early years settings.
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What this unit is about
AS 1 Promoting Quality Care is an internally assessed (portfolio) unit. CCEA wants you to understand the values of care that underpin good practice, the rights of service users, the responsibilities of care workers, and how settings promote quality care while guarding against discrimination and the abuse of power. Because it is assessed through coursework rather than a written examination, this page is a single concise overview of the unit rather than a set of separate examinable dot points.
The values of care
CCEA expects you to know the values of care for both health and social care and for early years. The health and social care values are: promoting equality and diversity, maintaining confidentiality, and promoting individuals' rights and beliefs. The early years values place additional emphasis on the welfare of the child, keeping children safe, working in partnership with parents and families, encouraging children's learning and development, valuing diversity, and confidentiality. Applying these values in practice is what turns a service from merely adequate into one that delivers genuine quality care.
Rights of service users and responsibilities of workers
Care workers uphold these rights through person-centred care (planning around the individual rather than the routine), anti-discriminatory practice (actively challenging prejudice and adapting care to diversity), confidentiality (secure records, sharing only with consent and on a need-to-know basis), and safeguarding (recognising, reporting and preventing abuse). A central theme of the unit is the imbalance of power between care workers and service users, and how good practice redresses it by empowering people, offering choice, and enabling independence and advocacy.
How quality is maintained
Quality care is not only down to individual workers; it is supported by codes of practice, national minimum standards, regulation and inspection (in Northern Ireland the Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority, RQIA), staff training and vetting, complaints procedures, and policies on confidentiality, safeguarding and equality. These structures hold settings to account and give service users routes to redress when standards slip.
How this unit is assessed
AS 1 is assessed by an internally assessed portfolio (controlled assessment), marked by your centre and moderated by CCEA, rather than by a written examination. Strong portfolios choose a real or realistic setting, apply each value of care and service-user right to it with concrete examples, and explain how the setting promotes quality and guards against discrimination and abuse of power.
Try this
Q1. State the three values of care for health and social care settings. [3 marks]
- Cue. Promoting equality and diversity; maintaining confidentiality; promoting individuals' rights and beliefs.
Q2. Explain one way a care setting can redress the imbalance of power between staff and service users. [2 marks]
- Cue. Offering genuine choice and consultation, enabling independence, or providing access to an advocate.
Q3. Name the body that regulates and inspects health and social care services in Northern Ireland. [1 mark]
- Cue. The Regulation and Quality Improvement Authority (RQIA).
Exam-style practice questions
Practice questions written in the style of CCEA exam questions on this dot point, with worked answer explainers. The year tag is the paper they imitate, not the source.
CCEA AS 1 portfolio12 marksExplain how a care worker in a residential home for older people applies the values of care to promote quality care for a named service user.Show worked answer →
AS 1 is internally assessed, so this is the kind of extended account you build in your portfolio rather than a timed exam answer. Quality work names the values and applies each one to the chosen setting with concrete detail.
Promoting equality and diversity: the worker treats every resident with the same standard of care regardless of background, and adapts care to individual culture, religion, language and dietary needs (for example providing halal meals or a same-sex carer where requested).
Maintaining confidentiality: care plans and personal records are stored securely and shared only on a need-to-know basis with consent, so the resident's private information is protected.
Promoting individual rights and beliefs: the worker supports choice (when to rise, what to wear, which activities to join), respects religious observance, and enables independence rather than doing everything for the resident.
Markers reward a precise statement of each value, applied to a realistic, named situation, with a clear link to how it raises the quality of the service user's experience.
CCEA AS 1 portfolio10 marksDescribe two service-user rights and explain how a care setting upholds each one.Show worked answer →
Choose two rights from the recognised list and pair each with a practical mechanism the setting uses.
The right to be respected and treated with dignity: the setting upholds this by knocking before entering, using the resident's preferred name, providing privacy during personal care, and never speaking about the resident as if they were not present.
The right to be protected from harm and abuse (safeguarding): the setting upholds this through staff vetting (AccessNI checks), training in recognising abuse, clear reporting procedures, and a named safeguarding lead.
Other rights you could use include the right to confidentiality, the right to equal and fair treatment, the right to consultation and choice, and the right to make a complaint.
Markers reward correctly named rights and a specific, realistic way the setting delivers each, rather than vague assertions.
Related dot points
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- The concepts and definitions of health and wellbeing: positive, negative and holistic definitions, the World Health Organization definition, and the physical, intellectual, emotional and social dimensions of wellbeing.
A CCEA AS 3 answer on the concepts of health and wellbeing: positive, negative and holistic definitions, the World Health Organization definition, and the physical, intellectual, emotional and social dimensions, and why the way health is defined shapes how care is planned and measured.
- The structure and provision of health and social care services: the statutory, voluntary, private and informal sectors, the types of service they provide, and how services are organised and funded in Northern Ireland.
A CCEA A2 3 answer on the structure and provision of health and social care services: the statutory, voluntary, private and informal sectors, the services each provides, and how care is organised and funded, with reference to the integrated health and social care system in Northern Ireland.
- Safeguarding and quality assurance in service provision: the types and signs of abuse, safeguarding procedures for adults and children, and the policies, standards, regulation and inspection that assure the quality of care.
A CCEA A2 3 answer on safeguarding and quality assurance in health and social care: the types and signs of abuse, the safeguarding procedures used to protect vulnerable adults and children, and the policies, standards, regulation and inspection (including the RQIA) that assure the quality of services.
- Overview of A2 5 Supporting the Family: the types and functions of the family, the changes and pressures families face, and the services, policies and professionals that support families in health and social care.
An overview of the internally assessed CCEA A2 5 Supporting the Family unit: the types and functions of the family, the changes and pressures families face, and the services, policies and professionals that support families across health, social care and early years.
Sources & how we know this
- CCEA GCE Health and Social Care specification — CCEA (2016)