Spring Hall Medical Practice

Updated 6 March 2024

Spring Hall Medical Practice provides General Medical Services (GMS) under a locally agreed contract with NHS England to a patient list of 29,028. The service operates from 5 locations, of which 2 locations (Rosegarth Surgery and Siddal Surgery) merged with the practice in April 2023.

• Spring Hall Medical Practice, 173c Spring Hall Lane, Halifax, HX1 4JG
• Queens Road Surgery, 252 Queens Road, Halifax, HX1 4NJ
• Rosegarth Surgery, Rothwell Mount, Halifax, HX1 2HB
• Southowram Surgery, Law Lane, Southowram, Halifax, HX3 9QB
• Siddal Surgery, 117 Oxford Road, Siddal, Halifax, HX3 9DG

The practice is located within the area covered by NHS West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board (ICB) - Calderdale. The practice is part of a wider group of GP practices known as a Primary Care Network (PCN). Spring Hall Group Practice is part of Central Halifax PCN.

The practice is registered as an organisation with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to deliver the regulated activities treatment of disease, disorder or injury, diagnostic and screening procedures, maternity and midwifery services, family planning and surgical procedures.

The clinical team comprises 9 GP partners (6 male and 3 female), 6 salaried GPs (2 male and 4 female) and 2 GP registrars. In addition, the clinical team comprises 3 advanced clinical practitioners, 2 of whom are trainees, 2 physician associates, a mental health practitioner, 6 practice nurses, 2 healthcare assistants and 3 phlebotomists. Supporting the clinical team are 2 practice managers, 2 operations managers, a data quality officer, and 3 reception team leaders working alongside a team of 12 administrative and 29 reception staff.

In addition, the practice is supported by PCN staff which includes physician associates, a mental health practitioner, an ageing well practitioner, physiotherapists, podiatrists, social prescribers, phlebotomists and clinical pharmacists.

The service is open from 8am to 6.30pm at all 5 locations. When the service is closed, patients are directed to contact NHS 111 for out-of-hours care. Pre-bookable extended access appointments are available on Monday to Friday from 6.30pm to 8pm and Saturday from 10am to 2pm at the service’s Queen’s Road Surgery and on Saturday from 10am to 2pm at the Boulevard Medical Practice which is a neighbouring practice in their PCN.

Information published by Office for Health Improvement and Disparities shows that deprivation within the practice population group is in the second lowest decile (2 of 10). 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 54% White, 40% Asian, 2% Black, 2% Mixed, and 2% Other.

Updated 6 March 2024

We undertook an announced targeted assessment of the responsive key question at Spring Hall Medical Practice on 30 January 2024.

We have rated the responsive key question as requires improvement as feedback from several sources indicates that people who use the service are not always able to access care and treatment in a timely way. Although we saw that the provider was addressing the access challenges through various measures, and some improvements have been noted, this has not yet been fully reflected in the National GP Patient Survey, NHS patient feedback platforms and some feedback gathered during the assessment process. Therefore, the rating of requires improvement has been given as ratings depend on evidence of impact and must reflect the lived experience that people were reporting at the time of assessment.

As the other domains were not reviewed during this assessment, the rating of good will be carried forward from the previous inspection in June 2022 and the overall rating of the service will remain good.

Safe – Not inspected, rating of Good carried forward from previous inspection

Effective - Not inspected, rating of Good carried forward from previous inspection

Caring - Not inspected, rating of Good carried forward from previous inspection

Responsive – Requires Improvement

Well-led - Not inspected, rating of Good carried forward from previous inspection

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

Why we carried out this inspection

We carried out this assessment as part of our work to understand how practices are working to try to meet demand for access and to better understand the experiences of people who use services and providers.

We recognise the work that GP practices have been engaged in to continue to provide safe, quality care to the people they serve. We know colleagues are doing this while demand for general practice remains exceptionally high, with more appointments being provided than ever. In this challenging context, access to general practice remains a concern for people.

Our strategy makes a commitment to deliver regulation driven by people’s needs and experiences of care. These assessments of the responsive key question include looking at what practices are doing innovatively to improve patient access to primary care and sharing this information to drive improvement.

How we carried out the inspection

This assessment was carried out remotely. It did not include a site visit. The process included:

• Conducting an interview with the provider using video conferencing.
• Reviewing patient feedback from a range of sources
• Requesting evidence from the provider.
• Reviewing data we hold about the service
• Seeking information/feedback from relevant stakeholders

Our findings

We based our judgement of the responsive key question on a combination of:

• what we found when we spoke with the provider
• information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services and
• information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

We found that:

• The provider organised and delivered services to meet patients’ needs.
• Patient feedback indicated that they were not always able to access care and treatment in a timely way. The provider was aware of this and addressing the challenges to access.
• Complaints were listened to, managed appropriately and used to improve the quality of care.

Whilst we found no breaches of regulations, the provider should:

• Continue to monitor and take steps to improve telephone and appointment access.

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 Health Care