Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Station Drive Surgery on 19 July 2016. Overall the practice is rated as good.

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

• Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise concerns and report incidents and near misses. All opportunities for learning from internal and external incidents were maximised.

• 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.

• The practice used innovative and proactive methods to improve patient outcomes, working with other local providers to share best practice. For example, the practice had instigated and shared Medical Advice Forms, now used across the Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) to help improve efficiency and speed of advice.

• Feedback from patients about their care was consistently positive.
• 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.

• The practice worked closely with other organisations and with the local community in planning how services were provided to ensure that they meet patients’ needs. For example, patients could directly access physiotherapy and self-refer without GP authorisation. A Physiotherapy assessment service offered 15-minute physiotherapy assessment appointments bookable via the practice reception team every Thursday morning at the practice.

• The practice implemented suggestions for improvements and made changes to the way it delivered services as a consequence of feedback from patients and from the patient participation group. For example, they had improved opening times, conducted a patient waiting time audit, and completed surveys of extended access available at the practice since August 2015. They also completed building improvements with the PPG involved in the design, which was completed in 2016.
• The practice had good facilities and was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.
• The practice had a clear vision, which had quality and safety as its top priority. The strategy to deliver this vision had been produced with stakeholders and was regularly reviewed and discussed with staff.
• The practice had strong and visible clinical and managerial leadership and governance arrangements.

However there were areas of practice where the provider should make improvements:

• Improve the documentation of actions taken following any risk assessments.

• Consider a system to support patients who may be hearing impaired in the absence of a hearing loop.

• Improve the visibility of information on the availability of interpreter services within the waiting room.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice