Build your own audits
Built-in audit templates are a great starting point, but no template can anticipate every check a particular service needs to run. A local requirement, a lesson learned from an incident, a specific concern a manager wants to monitor: these often do not fit a standard form, and forcing them to leaves you either bending a template or dropping the audit into a spreadsheet outside your main system.
Audits shaped around your service.
Build your own audits lets you create custom audits from scratch, defining the questions and the structure that suit the thing you actually want to check. Rather than being limited to the built-in templates, you can capture a local requirement, a specific area of practice or a bespoke concern in an audit that fits it exactly, and run it as a first-class part of your quality programme.
This matters because good governance is specific to a service. The standard audits cover the common ground, but the checks that catch your particular risks are often ones only you know you need. Being able to build them, and track them alongside everything else, means your whole audit picture stays in one place instead of splitting between the platform and stray spreadsheets.
CareStream lets care providers build their own custom audits, with their own questions and structure, not just use the templates that come as standard. Any local or bespoke audit you need can run and be tracked in the same place as everything else, so nothing has to live outside the system just because it is specific to you.
Any care home, nursing home or care provider with local or bespoke checks that the standard audit templates do not cover.
Because your own audits run and are tracked in the same system, you can show CQC a complete governance picture, including the checks specific to your service.
The difference it makes day to day
- You can create audits with your own questions, tailored to what your service actually needs to check.
- Local or bespoke requirements are captured in the platform rather than dropped into a spreadsheet.
- Custom audits run and are tracked in the same place as the built-in templates.
- You are no longer limited to standard forms when a check does not fit one.
- Your entire audit programme, standard and bespoke, stays visible in one system.
- Lessons from incidents or local concerns can become a repeatable audit you actually run.
How building your own audit works.
The process is designed so that creating a custom audit feels as natural as filling one in. You decide what you want to check, write the questions in your own words, and set out the structure that makes sense for the subject.
Once built, your custom audit behaves exactly like a standard one. You run it, record the results, and track it over time within the same audit system, so a bespoke check gets all the same benefits as the templates that came with the platform.
Choose to build
Start a custom audit when a check you need does not fit any of the built-in templates.
Write your questions
Add your own questions in your own words, capturing exactly what you want to assess.
Set the structure
Arrange the audit the way that suits the subject, so it reads and runs the way your service works.
Carry out your custom audit exactly as you would a standard one, recording results as you go.
Follow your bespoke audit's results across runs, the same way you track built-in audits.
Run the audit again whenever you need it, and adjust the questions as your requirements change.
- Create audits with your own questions and structure.
- Not limited to the built-in templates.
- Custom audits run and are tracked in the same system as standard ones.
- Local, bespoke and incident-driven checks all stay inside the platform.
- Reusable, so a one-off concern can become a repeatable audit.
Good governance is specific to your service.
Standard templates cover the checks every service shares, but they can never cover the ones unique to yours, and the moment a check does not fit a template it tends to escape into a spreadsheet where it is easily forgotten. That is how the audits closest to your real risks end up being the least well tracked.
CareStream works because it lets you build those bespoke audits inside the platform, with your own questions and structure, and run them alongside the standard ones. Nothing has to live outside the system, so your whole governance picture stays complete and in one place.
Write exactly the questions your service needs to ask, not a template's approximation.
Local, bespoke and incident-driven audits all have a home in the platform.
Custom and standard audits run and are tracked side by side.
A one-off concern becomes an audit you can run again and again.
Frequently asked
Can I really build an audit with my own questions?
Yes. Alongside the built-in templates, CareStream lets you create custom audits from scratch, writing your own questions in your own words and setting the structure that suits what you want to check. You are not limited to standard forms, so a local requirement or a bespoke concern can be captured in an audit that fits it exactly. Once built, your custom audit behaves just like a standard one. You run it, record the results and track it over time within the same audit system, so a bespoke check gets all the same benefits and visibility as the templates that come as standard.
How is a custom audit different from the built-in templates?
The built-in templates cover the common audits that most services need, giving you a fast start on the shared ground. Custom audits are for the checks that are specific to your service, where no standard template quite fits, such as a local requirement or a concern that came out of a particular incident. The important part is that both live in the same place. Your custom audits are not a separate, second-class tool, they run and are tracked exactly like the standard ones, so your whole audit programme stays in one system rather than splitting between the platform and stray spreadsheets.
Can I reuse a custom audit or is it a one-off?
Custom audits are reusable, so a concern that started as a one-off can become an audit you run regularly. Once you have built it, you can run it again whenever you need to, and follow its results across runs the same way you would track any built-in audit. This is particularly useful for turning lessons into practice. When an incident or a local issue reveals something worth monitoring, you can build an audit for it once and then keep checking against it over time, adjusting the questions as your requirements change, so the learning actually sticks.
Does having my own audits help at inspection?
It does, because good governance is specific to a service and inspectors want to see that you monitor the things that matter for your particular setting, not just the generic checklist. Being able to build and run bespoke audits shows that you understand your own risks and have put deliberate checks in place for them. Just as importantly, because custom audits run and are tracked in the same system as the standard ones, you can present a complete governance picture rather than a partial one. Nothing important is hidden in a spreadsheet outside the platform, so your whole quality programme, standard and bespoke, is visible and evidenced in one place.
Explore more features
More of what the CareStream compliance platform does for UK care providers.
Build the audits your service actually needs.
See how CareStream lets you create custom audits with your own questions and track them alongside the built-in templates.
