Halbutt Street Medical Practice Also known as Halbutt Street Surgery

Updated 13 September 2022

Halbutt Street Medical Practice is located at 2 Halbutt Street, Dagenham, RM9 5AS. The practice has good transport links and is within easy reach of bus and train services providing direct access into Central London.

There is a clinical team of two GP partners; one salaried GP; two regular locum GPs and two practice nurses. Clinical staff are supported at the practice by a practice manager and a team of reception and administration staff.

The provider is registered with CQC to deliver the Regulated Activities; diagnostic and screening procedures, surgical procedures, treatment of disease, disorder or injury and family planning.

The practice reception is open Monday-Friday between 8am-7pm and appointments are available between these times. Patients may book appointments online, by telephone or in person.

The practice is situated within the North East London Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and delivers General Medical Services (GMS) to a patient population of approximately 6100. This is part of a contract held with NHS England. They are part of a wider network of GP practices in East Primary Care Network.

Information published by Public Health England shows that deprivation within the practice population group is in the second lowest decile (two of ten). The lower the decile, the more deprived the practice population is relative to others. According to the latest available data, the ethnic make-up of the practice area is 62.3%Asian, 19.3% White, 11.5% Black, 3.2% Mixed, and 3.7% Other.

Extended access is provided locally by the GP hub, where late evening and weekend appointments are available. Out of hours services are provided by PELC.

Updated 13 September 2022

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Halbutt Street Medical Practice on 17 and 18 August 2022. Overall, the practice is rated as requires improvement.

Safe - requires improvement

Effective - good

Caring - requires improvement

Responsive - requires improvement

Well-led - requires improvement

At the comprehensive inspection on 29 July 2021, the practice was rated good overall but with requires improvement in Safe and a breach of regulation 12. Specifically that inspection found concerns with:

• The management of high-risk medicines and medicines that required additional monitoring.
• Safe care and treatment for patients with long term health conditions, for example, diabetes.

A follow up inspection was carried out for the regulation 12 concerns on 13 June 2022. Only Safe was inspected and it was unrated. Concerns and risks were found in Safe, these included:

• The provider did not have reliable systems and processes to keep patients safeguarded from abuse.
• The provider did not have a safe system in place to manage safeguarding training for staff.
• The provider did not have appropriate safeguarding policies in place for children and vulnerable adults.
• The provider did not have appropriate systems in place to safely manage high-risk medicines and medicines that require additional monitoring.
• The provider did not have a safe system in place to monitor and manage recruitment, including disclosure and barring checks (DBS).
• The provider did not have a safe effective system in place to manage patient safety alerts.
• The provider did not operate a safe system regarding infection prevention and control, this included staff immunisations and certified immunity.
• The provider did not have a safe system in place to manage sepsis training for staff.

The full reports for previous inspections can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Halbutt Street Medical Practice on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

Why we carried out this inspection

We carried out this inspection to follow up concerns and one breach of regulation from the previous two inspections.

How we carried out the inspection

This inspection was carried out in a way which enabled us to spend a minimum amount of time on site.

This included:

• Completing clinical searches on the practice’s patient records system (this was with consent from the provider and in line with all data protection and information governance requirements).
• Reviewing patient records to identify issues and clarify actions taken by the provider.
• Requesting evidence from the provider.
• A short site visit.

Our findings

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service 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 found that:

• A large number of patient records and notes had not been summarised and added to the clinical records system.
• There was an effective system in place to ensure safety alerts were disseminated and considered.
• The practice had robust safeguarding measures in place.
• Clinical waste was not being safely managed.
• The premises had no cleaning log sheets.
• 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.
• Patients could access care and treatment in a timely way.
• The way the practice was led and managed promoted the delivery of high-quality, person-centre care.
• The provider had appropriate systems in place to safely manage high-risk medicines and medicines that require additional monitoring.
• The provider had a safe system in place to monitor and manage recruitment, including disclosure and barring checks (DBS).
• The provider did not operate a safe system regarding infection prevention and control, this included staff immunisations and certified immunity.
• The provider had a safe system in place to manage sepsis training for staff.

We found one breach of regulations. The provider must:

• Ensure that care and treatment is provided in a safe way.

The provider should:

• Consider recruiting more staff to support its reception and administration team.

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

Dr Sean O’Kelly BSc MB ChB MSc DCH FRCA

Chief Inspector of Hospitals and Interim Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services