Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Praze-An-Beeble Surgery on 15 June 2016. The overall rating for the practice was requires improvement. The full comprehensive report on the June 2016 inspection can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Praze-An-Beeble Surgery on our website at www.cqc.org.uk .

This inspection was an announced focused inspection carried out on 10 January 2017 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 15 June 2016 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

• There was an open and transparent approach to safety and an effective system in place for reporting and recording significant events.

• There were Improvements to governance processes. Policies had been reviewed and the number of clinical audits had increased and demonstrated improvements in patient care.

• A Patient Participation Group had been formed and had met to discuss how the group would work.

• Communication had improved and was done both informally and formally through an increased number of meetings.

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 Praze-an-Beeble Surgery on 15 June 2016. Overall the practice is rated as Requires Improvement

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 were able to report incidents, near misses and concerns; however, evidence of learning from the events and communication of outcomes and actions with staff, which might improve the service, was limited.

• Risks to patients were assessed and well managed.
• 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.
• 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. Improvements were made to the quality of care as a result of complaints and concerns.
• Patients said they found it easy to make an appointment with a named GP and there was continuity of care, with urgent appointments available the same day.
• Feedback from patients about the care and treatment they received and about the services provided was consistently high and above local and national averages in many areas.
• 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. Although some audits had been carried out, we saw no evidence that audits were driving improvement in performance to improve patient outcomes.
• The provider was aware of and complied with the requirements of the duty of candour.

The areas where the provider must make improvement are:

• Ensure systems and processes are put in place to improve communication between all staff teams; particularly in regard of sharing learning from significant events, complaints, audits and service feedback.

• Ensure systems and processes in support of clinical audits and re-audits are put in place to improve patient outcomes.

• Ensure systems and process are developed to ensure that blood tests and GP interventions take place before high-risk medicines are prescribed.

• Ensure systems for monitoring medicines to ensure they are in date and stored in line with manufacturers guidelines.

The areas where the provider should make improvement are:

• Review systems for information kept about medicines deliveries to ensure that patients receive their medicines safely.

• Obtain patient feedback through a patient participation group.

• Ensure controlled drug stock checks at the interval defined in dispensary procedures

Professor Steve Field CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP

Chief Inspector of General Practice