Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice
We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection visit of Clement Road Medical Practice in August 2016. As a result of our comprehensive inspection the practice was rated as requires improvements for providing safe services. This was because we identified areas where the provider must make improvement and also some areas where the provider should improve.
We undertook a focused inspection on 12 April 2017 to check that the provider had made improvements in line with providing safe services. This report only covers our findings in relation to those requirements. You can read the report from our previous inspections by selecting the 'all reports' link for Clement Road Medical Practice on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.
Our key findings across all the areas we inspected were as follows:
- During our comprehensive inspection on 25 August 2016 we found that the practice could not demonstrate that the nurses also received safety alerts. When observing the alerts process during our follow up inspection we saw that alerts were disseminated across the whole practice team and acted on where required.
- When we inspected the practice in 2016 we found that systems were not effective across all areas such as following up on child missed appointments at hospital. As part of our most recent inspection, we noted that there was a process for monitoring and following up on missed hospital appointments, for adult and child patients. However, we found that the GPs did not always keep a record to evidence when they had reviewed the missed hospital appointments.
- Previously we found that risk had not been assessed in the absence of emergency medicine associated with minor surgery and fitting specific contraceptive devices. We also found that regular fire alarm tests and fire drills had not taken place in the practice. During our follow up inspection we observed adequate stock of emergency medicine suitable for the practice and the services provided. Records were kept to demonstrate that the fire alarm was frequently tested and we saw that a fire drill had recently taken place.
- When we inspected the practice in August 2016, we identified an area where the practice should improve with regards to supporting carers. During our follow up inspection we noted significant improvement and due to staff taking an active approach in identifying carers, we found that the carers register had increased from 3% to 4% between August 2016 and April 2017. These carers were offered support, flexible appointments and flu vaccinations.
- For instance, due to staff taking an active approach to identifying carers we found that the carers register had increased from 3% to 4% between August 2016 and April 2017. Flu vaccinations were offered to carers and carers were included in the programme for flu vaccinations to ensure that they were contacted and offered a flu vaccine.
- Since our previous inspection, comprehensive carer packs had been developed by the practice; these packs were handed out to all carers. The packs contained a wide range of information including signpost information to various carer support groups, this included support for young carers; to help the young carers identified on the practices register.
We identified one area of practice where the provider should make improvements:
- Improve record keeping specifically when reviewing missed hospital appointments, to reflect the system used in practice when reviewing and following up on missed hospital appointments.
Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP)
Chief Inspector of General Practice