Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at The Village Surgery on 19 February 2016. Overall the practice is rated as good.

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

• The practice is situated in a large purpose built health centre with access to other services such as phlebotomy. The practice was clean and had good facilities including disabled access, translation services and a hearing loop.

• There were systems in place to mitigate safety risks including analysing significant events and safeguarding.

• Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered in line with current legislation.

• 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. The practice sought patient views about improvements that could be made to the service; including carrying out surveys and having a patient participation group (PPG) and acted, where possible, on feedback.

• Many of the staff had worked at the practice for a long time and knew the patients well. Staff worked well together as a team and all felt supported to carry out their roles.

However, there were areas where the provider should make improvements:

• Have a monitoring system in place for any blank prescriptions still in stock.

• Strengthen communications between all staff by having policies and procedures readily available to all staff and facilitating the attendance of all staff at staff meetings.

• Produce information that is readily available for locum GPs (locum induction pack)

• Hold regular reviews of significant events and complaints over set periods of time to identify any trends to help improve the service provided.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

The Village Surgery is based in Garston, a suburb of Liverpool, within a large purpose built NHS Treatment Centre. There are car parking facilities and several other NHS facilities on the same site, including physiotherapy, podiatry and a pharmacy. There are currently two full time and three part time GPs at the practice, in addition to one advanced nurse practitioner, two practice nurses, a practice manager and administrative/reception staff. The practice treats people of all ages and provides a full range of medical services to approximately 6,200 patients.

We spoke with four patients who used the service and the chairperson of the Patient Participation Group (PPG) during our inspection. A PPG is made up of a group of volunteer patients and practice staff who meet regularly to discuss the services on offer and how improvements can be made for the benefits of the local patient population and the practice. Everyone spoke positively about the practice and commented that they were happy with the care and treatment they had received. Some comments made were, “They are marvellous”, “They treat me really well” and “My doctor is one of the best.”

Patients were treated by staff that were appropriately trained and supported. The environment within the surgery was clean and tidy and the quality of the service provided was monitored on a regular basis.