The Care Quality Commission
  • Doctor
  • GP practice

Archived: Allington Clinic Also known as CMG Healthcare

Overall: Good read more about inspection ratings

26 Tichborne Close, Maidstone, Kent, ME16 0RY (01622) 679020

Provided and run by:
The Churchill Clinic

All Inspections

2 February 2016

During a routine inspection

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Allington Clinic on 2 February 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.

  • Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered following best practice guidance. Staff had received training appropriate to their roles.

  • All risks to patients were consistently assessed and well managed.

  • Patients’ records that contained confidential information were held in a secure way so that only authorised staff could access them.

  • Patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect and they were involved in their care and decisions about their treatment. Information was provided to help patients understand the care available to them. Feedback from patients about their care was consistently and strongly positive as well as significantly better than local and national feedback averages.

  • The practice worked closely with other organisations and with the local community in planning how services were provided to help ensure that they met people’s needs. For example, in their professional interactions with a local nursing home, parents of and children on the ‘at risk’ register and those in vulnerable circumstances. There were regular six to eight weekly multidisciplinary meetings, as well as ‘as required’ meetings that were held if issues arose before the next scheduled meeting.

  • Urgent appointments were available the same day and pre bookable appointments were available up to four weeks in advance.

  • 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 (PPG). Patients who had had cause to complain were invited to join the PPG, in order to encourage them to be involved in the way the practice is operated.

  • The practice had good facilities and was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs. Information about how to complain was available and easy to understand.

  • There was a business plan that was monitored, regularly reviewed and discussed with all staff. High standards were promoted and owned by all practice staff with evidence of team working across all roles.

  • There was a clear leadership structure and staff felt supported by management.

  • Governance and performance management arrangements were under constant review. The practice actively sought out and used data from wide range of sources.

We saw areas of outstanding practice including:

  • The lead GP for safeguaring children knew the school nurse for each child and was aware of the issues at each school that the child attended, in order to help ensure they were aware of any mitigating factors which could have an impact on the child’s health.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

21 May 2014

During a routine inspection

Allington Clinic and Lockmeadow provide primary medical services Monday to Fridays for patients in the surrounding areas of Maidstone in Kent. The two clinics are part of the Churchill Medical Group. Both practices are led by three general practitioners (GPs) who form the partnership management team. The senior partner is the registered provider of services at both practices. We visited both practices for this inspection.

We spoke with patients during our inspection and over the phone the following day, they were all very complimentary about the services they had received from the practice. We also received many positive comments from patients who had completed comment cards prior to our inspection. All expressed a high level of satisfaction with the practice and the staff. We also met with three members of the Patient Participation Group (PPG), who emphasised the support, engagement and good working relationship the group had with the GP partners at the practice. Staff we spoke with told us that the management were very supportive, open and approachable.

We found that the practice was well-led and provided caring, effective and responsive services to a wide range of patient groups, including those of working age and recently retired, mothers, babies, children and young people, patients with long term conditions and complex needs, people in vulnerable circumstances and people who were experiencing poor mental health. The practice provided an out of hours, on-call service for the patients registered.