We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Aintree Road Medical Centre on 16 October 2017. The overall rating for the practice was good but required improvement for providing safe services. The full comprehensive report for the 16 October 2017 inspection can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Aintree Road Medical Centre on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

This inspection was an announced focused inspection carried out on 26 February 2018 to confirm that the practice had carried out their plan to meet the legal requirements in relation to the breaches in regulations that we identified in our previous inspection on 16 October 2017. This report covers our findings in relation to those requirements and also additional improvements made since our last inspection.

Overall the practice is now rated as good and good for providing safe services.

Our key findings were as follows:

The practice had made improvements and addressed the issues identified in the previous inspection. Improvements included the implementation of:

• A display screen risk assessment for staff to ensure their working environment was safe.
• A disability access risk assessment.
• Regular audits of high risk medications to ensure patients received appropriate checks.

In addition the practice had:

• Installed a television in the waiting room for additional supporting information for patients.
• Updated the clinical protocols available for clinicians for chronic disease management.
• Implemented a new protocol for dealing with uncollected prescriptions to ensure all staff were aware of what to do and that the prescriptions were reviewed by a GP prior to being destroyed.
• Reviewed the current national GP patient survey data and designed surveys to give out to patients later in the year, to see how they could address areas where the practice was performing lower than local and national averages.
• Updated the alert system on patients’ records for safeguarding.
• Implemented plans for all GPs to carry out a minimum of two clinical audits per annum to improve patient outcomes.
• Updated the reporting mechanism for incidents to encourage increased incident reporting and to improve shared learning.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Aintree Road Medical Centre on 16 October 2017. Overall the practice is rated as good but requires improvement for providing safe services.

Our key findings across all the areas we inspected were as follows:

• There was an open and transparent approach to safety and a system in place for reporting and recording significant events. However, there was a lack of formalised risk assessments and monitoring systems for the health and safety of the premises.
• Patients on high risk medications were not always regularly reviewed.
• Emergency medications were available but there was nothing available to treat meningitis. This was rectified on the day of the inspection.

• Staff were aware of current evidence based guidance. Staff had been trained to provide them with the skills and knowledge to deliver effective care and treatment. However, there were no practice level clinical protocols available for clinicians.
• Care Quality Commission (CQC) comment cards reviewed indicated that patients were treated with compassion, dignity and respect and were involved in their care and decisions about their treatment. However, patient satisfaction scores from the national GP patient survey were lower compared with local and national averages. The practice had carried out their own surveys and acted on results but had not addressed the most recent national GP patient survey data.
• Information about services and how to complain was available. Improvements were made to the quality of care as a result of complaints and concerns.
• Patients we spoke with said they found it easy to make an appointment. Urgent appointments were available the same day.
• There was a clear leadership structure and staff felt supported by management.

The provider must:

• Ensure care and treatment is provided in a safe way to patients

The areas where the provider should make improvement are:

• Review the information available in the waiting room and on the practice web site for additional support for patients.

• Review the clinical protocols available for clinicians for chronic disease management; and review the protocol for dealing with uncollected prescriptions to ensure all staff are aware of what to do and that the prescriptions are reviewed by a GP prior to being destroyed.

• Review the current national GP patient survey data and address any areas where the practice is performing lower than local and national averages.

• Review the alert system on patients’ records for safeguarding.

• Review plans for clinical audits to improve patient outcomes.

• Review the reporting mechanism for incidents to encourage increased incident reporting to improve shared learning.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice