City Road Medical Centre

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at City Road Medical Centre on 20 and 25 July 2023. Overall, the practice is rated as good.

Safe – good.

Effective – good.

Caring - good

Responsive - good

Well-led -outstanding

Why we carried out this inspection

We carried out this inspection to provide a rating for the practice. The practice had not been inspected previously since its registration with CQC in June 2022.

Under the previous provider, the practice had been rated requires improvement in December 2021 and before this had been in special measures after we inspected and rated the practice as inadequate in April 2021.

The full reports for previous inspections can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for City Road Medical Centre on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

We inspected the following key questions:

• Safe

• Effective

• Caring

• Responsive

• Well-led

How we carried out the inspection

This inspection was carried out in a way which enabled us to spend a minimum amount of time on site.

This included:

• Conducting staff interviews using video conferencing.
• Completing clinical searches on the practice’s patient records system (this was with consent from the provider and in line with all data protection and information governance requirements).
• Reviewing patient records to identify issues and clarify actions taken by the provider.
• Requesting evidence from the provider.
• A shorter site visit.

Our findings

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service on a combination of:

• what we found when we inspected
• information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services and
• information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

We found that:

• The provider took over the management of the practice in June 2022 and had reviewed and improved all systems and processes including implementing new governance systems.
• The provider demonstrated that a safe and high quality service was being provided and that the practice provided care in a way that kept patients safe and protected them from avoidable harm.
• The provider had implemented a comprehensive audit and quality assurance program that allowed them to monitor the effectiveness of care being provided. The provider demonstrated that patients received effective care and treatment that met their needs.
• Staff dealt with patients with kindness and respect and involved them in decisions about their care.
• Patients could access care and treatment in a timely way.

We rated the key question well-led as outstanding because:

• Leadership, governance and culture were used to drive and improve the delivery of high-quality person-centred care.
• Leaders had an inspiring shared purpose, and strived to deliver and motivate staff to succeed.
• Feedback from staff was consistently positive. Staff felt empowered to drive improvement and they had the support of the leadership team when doing this.
• There was strong collaboration and team-working and a common focus on improving the quality and sustainability of care and people’s experiences.
• The practice recognised that patient’s emotional and social needs were as important as their physical needs and supported patients with their holistic needs.
• Staff were valued within the organisation and given the opportunity to develop and progress professionally both in clinical and non-clinical roles.
• The provider had developed a comprehensive business plan that considered all aspects needed to provide high quality services.
• There was a fully embedded and systematic approach to risk management and quality improvement.

Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence tables.

Dr Sean O’Kelly BSc MB ChB MSc DCH FRCA

Chief Inspector of Health Care