We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection on 19 July 2016 to ask the practice the following key questions; Are services safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led?

Our findings were:

Are services safe?

We found this practice was providing safe care in accordance with the relevant regulations.

Are services effective?

We found this practice was providing effective care in accordance with the relevant regulations.

Are services caring?

We found this practice was providing caring services in accordance with the relevant regulations.

Are services responsive?

We found this practice was providing responsive care in accordance with the relevant regulations.

Are services well-led?

We found this practice was providing well-led care in accordance with the relevant regulations.

Background

Grendon Lodge is part of the Houston Group of Dental Practices. It has recently been fully renovated and offers a modern well equipped practice with disabled facilities and a ground floor surgery. There is free on street parking by the practice.

This modern dental practice uses the latest techniques and state of the art equipment. The services provided are both NHS and private and the fees for all services are displayed on the practice website and in information leaflets available in the practice for patients.

The practice has four treatment rooms, a waiting area and a local decontamination unit. One treatment room and a disabled toilet are available on the ground with level access throughout. The practice has a team of clinicians with a variety of expertise and patients may see different clinicians for different parts of their treatment.

The practice has a principal dentist and a practice manager. The registered manager works across all practices in the Houston group. A registered manager is a person who is registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the practice is run.

The practice is open Monday –Friday 9.00am - 1.00pm and 2.00pm – 5.30pm on Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday; on Tuesday 2.00pm - 7.30pm. The practice is closed at weekends. For emergency and out of hour’s assistance contact information is available from the practice telephone answering service.

We reviewed 49 CQC comment cards that had been left for patients to complete, prior to our visit, about the services provided. In addition we spoke with four patients on the day of our inspection. Feedback from patients was positive about the care they received from the practice. They commented staff put them at ease, listened to their concerns and provided an excellent service in which they had confidence in the dental care provided.

Our key findings were:

• There were systems in place to help ensure the safety of staff and patients. These included safeguarding children and adults from abuse, maintaining the required standards of infection prevention and control and responding to medical emergencies.

• The dental practice had effective clinical governance and risk management processes in place; including health and safety and the management of medical emergencies.

• The practice had a comprehensive system to monitor and continually improve the quality of the service; including through a detailed programme of clinical and non-clinical audits.

• Use of Loups –These enable the clinician to have a magnified view of the operation site thus enabling extreme accuracy of treatment.

• The use of digital photography to explain treatments to patients while in the chair and manipulate images to show outcome of proposed treatment.

• Premises were well maintained and a tour of the building confirmed that good cleaning and infection control systems were in place. The treatment rooms were well organised and equipped, with good light and ventilation.

• There were systems in place to check all equipment had been serviced regularly, including the air compressor, autoclave, fire extinguishers, oxygen cylinder and the X-ray equipment.

• There were sufficient numbers of suitably qualified staff who maintained the necessary skills and competence to support the needs of patients.

• Staff were up to date with current guidelines and the practice was led by a proactive principal dentist / provider.

• Staff were kind, caring, competent and put patients at their ease.

• Patients commented they felt involved in their treatment and that it was fully explained to them.

• Common themes from the CQC comment cards were patients felt they received excellent care in a clean environment from a helpful practice team who put them at their ease.

• Information about how to complain was available and easy to understand.