Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at The Oaks Medical Centre on 16 August 2016. Overall the practice is rated as good. There are two surgery locations that form the practice; these consist of the main practice at Shady Lane Great Barr and the branch practice at Chester Road Streetly. Both locations have separate CQC registrations; we have therefore produced two reports. There is one patient list and systems and processes are shared across both sites. The data included in this report relates to both locations. During the inspection, we visited both sites.

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.
• Risks to patients were assessed and well managed; there were arrangements in place to respond to emergencies and major incidents.
• Staff assessed patients’ needs and delivered care in line with current evidence based guidance. Staff had been trained to provide them with the skills, knowledge and experience to deliver effective care and treatment.
• There was a programme of continuous clinical audits, which demonstrated quality improvement and staff were actively engaged to monitor and improve patient outcomes.
• The practice implemented suggestions for improvements and made changes to the way it delivered services because of feedback from patients and from the patient participation group. For example, the practice introduced an electronic call management system; this improved the phone access, which enables the practice to reduce the volume of missed appointments’.
• On the day of the inspection patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect and they were involved in their care and decisions about their treatment; however, the national GP patient survey showed that questions relating to patient’s involvement in decisions were below local and national average.
• Information about services and how to complain was available and easy to understand. The practice actively reviewed complaints and how they are managed and responded to, and made improvements as a result. The provider was aware of and complied with the requirements of the duty of candour.
• Patients spoken to during the inspection said they found it hard to make a routine appointment with a named GP and felt this did not represent continuity of care; this was consistent with the national GP patient survey results. However, patients said urgent appointments were available the same day.

We saw one areas of outstanding practice where the practice used their knowledge of the local community and patient population as levers to deliver high quality, person centred care. The practice expanded the clinical team in order to respond to population needs. For example:

• The practice held a health awareness event in March 2016 where guest speakers from health organisations and charities such as, Diabetes UK, Alzheimer’s society and Heart care were available. During the weekend, patients were provided with the opportunity to speak to health care specialists to increase their knowledge in certain areas of health.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

• Ensure that recruitment procedures are operated effectively. For example, the practice should ensure

• Explore ways of improving the uptake of national screening programs such as breast and bowel cancer screening.

• Explore ways of improving the amount of care plan, medication and face-to-face review carried out on patients with a learning disability.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice