12 December 2014
During a routine inspection
Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice
We inspected this service on 12 December 2014 as part of our new comprehensive inspection programme.
The overall rating for this service is good. We found the practice to be good in the safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led domains. We found that the practice provided good care to all groups of its patient population.
Our key findings were:
- Patients received evidence based assessments and care and treatment was planned and delivered to promote a good quality of life.
- Staff treated patients with respect and kindness. Patients told us that staff were caring and compassionate.
- Services were planned and delivered to meet the needs of the patients. Patients were generally positive about the access to appointments.
- The leadership and management within the practice promoted an open and transparent culture. Staff felt able to contribute to the running of the service.
However, there were also areas of practice where the provider needs to make improvements. The provider should:
- Develop the criteria for significant events to ensure all significant occurrences (both positive and negative) are investigated and analysed to realise continuous improvement in the service
- Ensure that action taken following receipt of relevant national patient safety alerts is recorded and shared with staff
- Develop an action plan to demonstrate the effectiveness of actions taken to reduce the amount of antibiotic prescribing within the practice
- Develop and complete an on-going programme of clinical audits to evidence the quality of care provided and demonstrate improving patient outcomes
- Demonstrate and record evidence of effective joint working for patients with palliative care needs
- Ensure information about how to make a complaint is easily available for patients both on line and in reception and provide evidence that learning from complaints influences improvements in service delivery
Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP)
Chief Inspector of General Practice