Wholistic Medical Centre

Updated 25 November 2019

Wholistic Medical Centre provides private medical services in the City of Westminster in London. Services are provided to both adults and children aged five and above. The address of the registered provider is 8 Upper Wimpole Street, London, W1G 6LH. Wholistic Medical Centre is registered with the Care Quality Commission to provide the regulated activity: Treatment of disease, disorder or injury. Regulated activities are provided at one location.

The organisation is run by the GP who is also the registered manager for the service. A registered manager is a person who is registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons have a legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

The service is run from a leased premise at basement level, accessed via a lift or stairs from the ground floor. The premises used by patients consists of two patient waiting areas, one doctors’ consultation room, two patient toilets, both with accessible facilities and a staff office. There are also two treatment rooms used predominantly by other therapists employed by the service. The service is open for pre-booked consultations Monday to Friday from 10am to 6pm. Reception and telephone opening hours are between 10am to 6pm, Monday to Friday.

Wholistic Medical Centre aims to bring together medical and holistic perspectives, with an emphasis on prevention, early detection and early intervention. Regulated services offered at Wholistic Medical Centre include general medical consultations and treatment. Treatments may include prescribing of medicines and lifestyle advice and modifications.

The staff consist of one full time doctor who is the medical director of the service and a clinic administrator. The doctor is supported by a number of self-employed holistic practitioners.

How we inspected this service

Before visiting, we reviewed a range of information we hold about the service. During our visit we:

• Spoke with the medical director.
• Spoke with the clinic administrator.
• Looked at the systems in place for the running of the service.
• Reviewed feedback from 24 patients including CQC comment cards.

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.

Updated 25 November 2019

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at The Wholistic Medical Centre as part of our inspection programme. The service had been inspected before but had not been rated. The initial inspection in June 2018, found concerns in the delivery of safe care. A follow up inspection in December 2018 was carried out to check that improvements had been made. The findings from that inspection were that the service had made improvements and was providing safe care.

Wholistic Medical Centre provides private medical services to both adults and children aged five and above. The address of the registered provider is 8 Upper Wimpole Street, London, W1G 6LH.

This service is registered with CQC under the Health and Social Care Act 2008 in respect of some, but not all, of the services it provides. There are some exemptions from regulation by CQC which relate to particular types of regulated activities and services and these are set out in and of The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014. Wholistic Medical Centre provides a range of services, for example osteopathy, reflexology, acupuncture, wellbeing massages and body and face treatments, electro-lymphatic therapy, pulsed electromagnetic field therapy and digital infrared thermal imaging which are not within CQC scope of registration. Therefore, we did not inspect or report on these services.

The GP/provider is the registered manager. A registered manager is a person who is registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

We received 24 CQC comment cards about the service from people using the service, all of which were positive about the service. Patients reported being treated with kindness and respect.

Our key findings were :

• The clinic 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 clinic organised and delivered services to meet patients’ needs. Patients could access care and treatment in a timely way.
• The way the clinic was led and managed promoted the delivery of high-quality, person-centre care.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

• We recommend the provider undertakes Female genital mutilation (FGM) training as well as Prevent training as part of Safeguarding training and also consider attending the local CCG safeguarding meetings in order to keep up to date with current developments.
• Update their registration with the Central Alerting System (CAS) to ensure they receive the most up to date and relevant updates.
• Develop two cycle clinical audits with clear objective measures.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGP

Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care