Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Valley View Surgery on 08 June 2016. Overall the practice is rated as good.

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 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. The lead GP had met with patients to discuss their concerns and improvements were made to the quality of care as a result of complaints and concerns.
• Feedback forms for the Friends and Family test were available in several languages relevant to the patient group, including Bengali and Polish. The Friends and Family test is a survey which asks patients if they would recommend NHS services to other people based on the quality of the care they have received.
• Risks to patients were assessed and well managed. All staff had undertaken appropriate checks through the Disclosure and Barring Service check (DBS). (DBS checks identify whether a person has a criminal record or is on an official list of people barred from working in roles where they may have contact with children or adults who may be vulnerable).
• 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. The practice proactively sought feedback from staff and patients, which it acted on. Staff told us that they would feel confident to raise any concerns with the GP partners.
• Patients said that they did not find it easy to make an appointment or speak to a GP.
• The provider was aware of and complied with the requirements of the duty of candour.
• We found that out of hours reports were not always reviewed by a clinician and that the practice was slow to manage electronic post. The practice agreed to review these systems.

We saw one area of outstanding practice

• In addition to the Patient participation group (PPG), the practice hosted a number of community focussed social groups such as the” Knitter Natter” group. The practice and the partners used these groups to deliver health education messages and improve access to health care for their patients. For example, English lessons delivered at the practice also focussed on teaching people how to book and arrange appointments and what services were available.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

• The practice should continue to review the results of patient satisfaction surveys and ensure that it can meet the needs of the patient population in the future and improve access.
• The practice should ensure that all out of hours reports are reviewed by a clinician and that electronic post is managed in a timely manner.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

Our inspection on the 8 October 2013 found the provider was not carrying out appropriate recruitment checks. Also the practice did not have robust systems in place to reduce the risk and spread of health care associated infections. Following the inspection the provider wrote to us and told us they would take action to ensure they were compliant with these essential standards.

At this inspection we found the provider had reviewed their policies and procedures and implemented new systems which assessed the risk of and prevented the spread of health care associated infections. In addition they had reviewed the recruitment procedure to make sure it informed staff of the actions they must take to ensure only suitable staff were employed at the practice.

We spoke with four people who used the service, they told us they were very “happy” and would recommend the service. They were able to see a doctor promptly when they needed to and they had “no concerns or complaints at all”. One said “I have had a great service, it is excellent here”.

However we found appropriate checks were not always undertaken before staff began work.

People who used the service were protected from the risk of abuse because the provider had taken reasonable steps to identify the possibility of abuse and prevent abuse from happening.

Although we saw and three people told us the practice was always clean, we found the practice did not have robust systems in place which were designed to assess the risk of and prevent, detect and control the spread of health care associated infection.

There was an effective complaints system in place. Complaints people made were responded to appropriately.