Health Hub

Updated 10 July 2019

Health Hub is a service which provides management of ear, nose and throat conditions, general healthcare management, immunisations, and also other care not regulated by the CQC. Services are provided from 282 Milkwood Road, Herne Hill, London, SE2 0EZ in the London borough of Lambeth. All patients attending the service referred themselves for treatment; none are referred from NHS services. The patients seen at the service are not often seen on more than one occasion and as such the service does not maintain a formal patient list. The service is open Monday, Thursday and Friday from 8am to 4pm, Tuesday 8am until 7pm and Wednesday 8am until 5pm and one Saturday a month from 9am to 1pm. The service does not offer elective care outside of these hours.

The service is registered with the CQC to provide treatment of disease, disorder or injury and diagnostic and screening procedures.

During the inspection we used a number of methods to support our judgement of the services provided. For example, we interviewed staff, and reviewed documents relating to the service/clinic.

To get to the heart of patients’ experiences of care and treatment, we always ask the following five questions:

• Is it safe?
• Is it effective?
• Is it caring?
• Is it responsive to people’s needs?
• Is it well-led?

These questions therefore formed the framework for the areas we looked at during the inspection. Our inspection team was led by a CQC lead inspector. The team also included a GP specialist advisor.

Updated 10 July 2019

This service is rated as Good overall. (Previous inspection 27 February 2018, at which point the service was unrated. At that time the service was found not to be providing safe or well led care.)

The key questions are rated as:

Are services safe? – Good

Are services effective? – Good

Are services caring? – Good

Are services responsive? – Good

Are services well-led? – Good

We carried out this announced comprehensive inspection at Health Hub on 30 May 2019. We had previously carried out an announced comprehensive inspection on 27 February 2018. At that time the service was judged to be meeting the standards for providing effective, caring and responsive care and treatment but not to be providing safe or well led care.

The areas where we said that the provider must make improvement were:

• Ensure that systems and processes are in place to ensure safe care and treatment. This should include systems for delegated actions to nurses, medicines and equipment to manage emergencies and full infection control processes.
• Ensure that systems and processes are in place to ensure good governance. This should include ensuring staff are trained in relevant areas, supervision of the nurse working at the service, advertising the complaints process and monitoring and auditing care.

The areas where we said the provider should make improvements were:

• Review how MHRA alerts are processed and records maintained.
• Review how available the Needlestick policy is for staff who might require it in an emergency.
• Ensure that identification is verified for patients, parents and carers attending the service.

At this inspection we found that the service had addressed the issues from the last inspection.

We found that:

• The service provided care in a way that kept patients safe and protected them from avoidable harm.
• 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.
• The service organised and delivered services to meet patients’ needs. Patients could access care and treatment in a timely way.
• The way the service was led and managed promoted the delivery of high-quality, person-centre care.

Whilst we found no breaches of regulations, the areas where the provider should make improvements are:

• Minute meetings where serious incidents and safeguarding are discussed
• Consider engaging an external party to undertake an infection control audit.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGP

Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care