Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Glendevon Medical Centre on Tuesday 24 November 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

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

• There was an open and transparent approach to safety and an effective system in place for reporting and recording significant events. Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise concerns and report incidents and near misses.

• Risks to patients were assessed and well managed.
• Staff assessed patients’ needs and delivered care in line with current evidence based guidance. Staff had the skills, knowledge and experience to deliver effective care and treatment.
• Patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect and they were involved in their care and decisions about their treatment.
• Information about services and how to complain was available and easy to understand.
• Patients said they found the telephone call back service useful and said there was continuity of care, with urgent appointments available the same day.
• The practice had good facilities and was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.
• There was a clear leadership structure and staff felt supported by management. The practice proactively sought feedback from staff and patients, which it acted on.
• The provider was aware of and complied with the requirements of the Duty of Candour.

We saw an area of outstanding practice:

• The practice worked closely with other organisations and the local community to plan and improve services. GPs had provided health education sessions in local schools. The practice also provided carers checks, not only from their own patient list, but also on behalf of other practices. A second member of staff had been appointed to carry out carer checks using a flexible approach, which gave people the choice of being seen at the practice, or at home during the evening or weekend. This had resulted in a significant rise in the numbers of carers seen, for whom health and wellbeing had improved.

The areas where the provider should make improvement are:

• Systems should be introduced to ensure that all equipment in doctor’s bags is included in the scheduled programme of checks.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

We reviewed the information available to us about Glendevon Medical Centre on 29 May 2019. We did not find evidence of significant changes to the quality of service being provided since the last inspection. As a result, we decided not to inspect the surgery at this time. We will continue to monitor this information about this service throughout the year and may inspect the surgery when we see evidence of potential changes.