Archived: Brook Green Medical Centre

Updated 22 April 2020

Brook Green Medical Centre is located in Hammersmith in West London. The practice is the part of the Hammersmith & Fulham Partnership with four other practices. It provides NHS primary medical services through a General Medical Services contract to approximately 12,400 patients in the local community. The practice has a larger than average proportion of adults in the 25-44 age range and is ethnically diverse. Income deprivation levels for the practice population are close to the English average.

The practice staff team is comprised of six GP partners, eight salaried GPs, two practice nurses, three pharmacists, five healthcare assistants, an operations manager and a team of reception and administrative staff. The practice is an NHS GP training practice and a number of GP trainees (registrars) also work and train in the practice at any one time. Both male and female doctors are available.

The practice was open 8am to 8pm seven days a week. Walk-in appointments and telephone consultations for urgent health problems were available every weekday. The details of the ‘out of hours’ service were communicated in a recorded message accessed by calling the practice when closed and details can also be found on the practice website. Longer appointments were available for patients who needed them and those with long-term conditions. This also included appointments with a named GP or nurse. Pre-bookable appointments could be booked up to two weeks in advance. Patients could book appointments online.

Updated 22 April 2020

We carried out an inspection of Brook Green Medical Centre on 10 March 2020 due to the length of time since the last inspection. Following our review of the information available to us, including information provided by the practice, we focused our inspection on the following key questions: Effective and Well-led

Because of the assurance received from our review of information we carried forward the ratings for the following key questions: Safe, Caring and Responsive.

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service is 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 have rated this practice as good overall and good for population groups.

We found:

• The practice 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. The service routinely reviewed the effectiveness and appropriateness of the care it provided. It ensured that care and treatment was delivered according to evidence- based guidelines.
• They offered home visits and urgent appointments for those with enhanced needs and complex medical issues.
• Staff demonstrated commitment and engagement with the vision for the service. They were proud to work for the organisation.
• The practice promoted good health and prevention and provided patients with suitable advice and guidance.
• There was a focus on continuous learning and improvement at all levels of the organisation.
• There was a commitment and appetite to work with external partners.
• The service had comprehensive business development strategy and quality improvement plan that effectively monitored the service provided to assure safety and patient satisfaction.

The provider was rated Outstanding for the key question of Responsive in their previous inspection due to several areas including:

• The practice proactively engaged with a local homeless charity to provide care to homeless people who were not engaging with health or other formal services.
• The practice provided outstanding care for people with mental health problems, for example offering joint assessment with the psychiatric liaison worker. Staff members were carrying out research on personality disorder in primary care.
• The practice was innovative in engaging patients with long term conditions for example running an open event and the use of a volunteer expert patient to support patients with diabetes. The volunteer regularly attended the practice to talk with patients with diabetes and signpost them to other useful resources in the community.
• The practice was open about sharing feedback with staff and patients, for example posting anonymised patient comments and concerns and the practice response in the waiting area.
• The practice had worked hard to ensure that the patient reference group was representative in terms of ethnic diversity, age and employment status, for example, recruiting patients from a nursing home and trying to engage patients in vulnerable groups.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

• Continue to implement processes to improve the take up of childhood immunisations.
• Continue to implement processes to improve take up of cervical smears.

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

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGP

Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care

Updated 22 April 2020

Updated 22 April 2020

Updated 22 April 2020

Updated 22 April 2020

Updated 22 April 2020

Updated 22 April 2020