Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

This was a comprehensive inspection of Sparcells Surgery and was carried out on the 22 October 2014.

Overall, we found the practice was providing a good service.  We found good practice in the way the practice responded to the needs of older patients and patients with long term conditions, providing them with effective care and treatment. The practice had responded well to the needs of working patients and those patients who had barriers to accessing GP services.

Our key findings were as follows:

• The practice was nurse led with a highly qualified nursing team with one GP providing care and treatment each day
• Appointments were easily accessible on the same day but not as accessible to see the GP of choice, however, arrangements were in place to ensure consistency for those patients who had complex needs
• Patients were highly satisfied and had confidence in the nursing team, who treated them with kindness and respect

There were also areas of practice where the provider needs to make improvements. 

The provider should put the following actions in place:

• Capture patient views regularly to ensure the practice acted on patient views and where needed improved the quality of service it provided.
• Establish an effective way to inform patients of why significant organisational changes in the practice have been made and how the changes may affect them, such as recruiting the nurse practitioner and what care and treatment they could carry out.
• Provide accurate information about how to complain externally on its website and themes of complaints should be shared as learning with the whole team.
• Ensure its policies and procedures are kept up to date and reviewed annually to ensure information is accurate and reflective of current guidelines.
• Ensure clinical audits follow a cycle to ensure improvements have been followed through.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

This practice is rated Good overall (The service was previously inspected in 2014, and rated as Good overall).

The key questions are rated as:

Are services safe? – Good

Are services effective? – Good

Are services caring? – Good

Are services responsive? – Good

Are services well-led? – Good

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Sparcells Surgery on 27 November 2018 as part of our inspection programme. Our judgement of the quality of care at this service is based on a combination of what we found when we inspected, information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services and information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

We have rated this practice as good overall.

This means that:

• Patients had good outcomes because they received effective care and treatment that met their needs.
• Patients were supported, treated with dignity and respect and were involved as partners in their care.
• People’s needs were met by the way in which services were organised and delivered.
• The leadership, governance and culture of the practice promoted the delivery of high quality person-centred care.
• Patients found the appointment system easy to use and reported that they were able to access care when they needed it.
• There was a strong focus on continuous learning and improvement at all levels of the organisation.

Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence tables.

Professor Steve Field CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP
Chief Inspector of General Practice