Background to this inspection
Updated
11 February 2020
Newnham Walk Surgery provides General Medical Services to approximately 16,200 patients and is situated to the West of Cambridge city centre. The practice is in close vicinity to Cambridge University and supports a large number of their students.
The practice has a team of ten GPs meeting patients’ needs (seven female and three male). Four GPs are partners meaning they hold managerial and financial responsibility for the practice. In addition, there are two nurse practitioners, four practice nurses and one health care assistant. The practice manager is supported by a team of reception and administration staff. Newnham Walk surgery is a training practice and two GP registrars provided clinics throughout the year. Medical students also attended the practice for training.
Appointments are available from 7am to 6pm Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, and from 8am to 6pm on Mondays and Fridays. The practice has a branch surgery in central Cambridge, called Cambridge City Centre Medical Practice. This provides alternate access to medical services for patients based or visiting central Cambridge and operated on a daily basis from Monday to Friday from 9am to 4pm with a GP and a nurse offering appointments. We did not visit this location as part of our inspection.
Outside of practice opening hours a service is provided by another health care provider, Herts Urgent Care, by patients dialling the national 111 service. Details of how to access emergency and non-emergency treatment and advice is available within the practice and on its website.
According to information taken from Public Health England, the patient population for this service has a significantly higher than average number of patients aged 15 to 44 years, compared to the practice average across England and a lower than average number of patients aged under 15 and aged 65 and over. 19% of people in the practice area were from black and minority ethnic groups. The index of multiple deprivation decile for the practice is 10. A score of 1 is the most deprived to a score of 10 being the least deprived. Life expectancy is 89 years for women, which is above the England average of 83 years. Life expectancy is 84 years for men, which is above the England average of 79 years.
Updated
11 February 2020
We carried out an announced, focused inspection of this service on 27 January 2020. This was to follow up on the breach of regulation identified at our previous inspection on 31 January 2019.
At the previous inspection, we rated the practice as good overall, with requires improvement for providing safe services and for providing effective services to the population group working age people (including those recently retired and students). At this inspection, we reviewed these areas and found the provider had made improvements. The comprehensive report on the 31 January 2019 inspection can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Newnham Walk Surgery on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.
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 for providing safe services and continues to be rated good overall.
At this inspection we found:
- Improvements had been made to processes in the management of high risk medicines, and we saw that the practice had oversight of high-risk medicine monitoring prior to prescribing.
- The prescribing of antibiotics was in line with the clinical commissioning group and England averages.
- The practice had completed an infection prevention and control audit. Some actions had been completed and a plan was in place which identified priorities for the remaining actions to be completed.
- The practice’s process for managing patient safety alerts had been reviewed, had improved and the new process had been embedded.
- The practice had worked to improve their oversight of the uptake of cervical screening for eligible patients aged 25 to 64 years. Work continued to identify patients who may have moved from the area and deduct them from the practice list, if appropriate, and patients who had opted to have cervical screening performed elsewhere were recorded on the patients record.
- The practice had reviewed their coding of carers to ensure it was accurate. Searches and audits had been undertaken to support the identification of carers. These focused on key patient groups, for example, patients vulnerable to admission to hospital, those who need a home visit and those with mental health needs.
- The practice had increased awareness of the patient participation group (PPG) though prescription notice invitations as well as advertising in the waiting rooms, on compliment slips and through the practice website.
The area where the practice
should
make improvements:
- Continue to review and improve the uptake of cervical screening.
Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence table.
Dr Rosie Benneyworth BS BM BMedSci MRCGPChief Inspector of General Practice
Working age people (including those recently retired and students)
Updated
11 February 2020
People experiencing poor mental health (including people with dementia)
Updated
6 March 2019