• Doctor
  • GP practice

Archived: Old Town Surgery

Overall: Good read more about inspection ratings

Curie Avenue, Okus, Swindon, Wiltshire, SN1 4GB (01793) 616057

Provided and run by:
Old Town Surgery

Important: The provider of this service changed. See new profile

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Background to this inspection

Updated 13 March 2019

The provider, Old Town Surgery, delivers regulated activities from its sole site at:

Old Town Surgery

Curie Avenue

Okus

Swindon

Wiltshire

SN1 4GB

Tel: 01793 616057

Website: www.oldtownsurgery.com

Old Town Surgery is based in Swindon, Wiltshire, and is one of 24 practices serving the NHS Swindon Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) area. The practice has free parking for its patients and is next to a pharmacy. There are parking bays for patients with a disability and automatic doors to enter the building. The surgery is spread across two floors with wide corridors, easy access for wheelchairs and has large consulting rooms to accommodate wheelchairs, prams and families. The surgery also has baby changing facilities and accessible toilets.

The practice has around 8,700 registered patients from an area surrounding the practice and Swindon Old Town. The practice age distribution is broadly in line with the national average, with most patients being of working age or older. Old Town Surgery is working with six other NHS GP practices locally, as part of the Wyvern Health Partnership. The aim of the working relationship is to develop services, share best practice and collaborate on health initiatives.

Eighty-nine per-cent of the practice population describes itself as white, and around 11% as having a Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) background. The practice boundary has an estimated low level of socio-economic deprivation: a local area measure recorded a score of 8, on a scale of 1-10, with a higher score indicating a less deprived area. (Note that the circumstances and lifestyles of the people living in an area affect its deprivation score. Not everyone living in a deprived area is deprived and not all deprived people live in deprived areas).

The practice has a General Medical Services (GMS) contract to deliver health care services. (A GMS contract is a contract between NHS England and general practices for delivering general medical services, and is the most common form of GP contract).

Old Town Surgery is registered to provide the following regulated activities:

  • Treatment of disease, disorder or injury
  • Diagnostic and screening procedures
  • Maternity and midwifery services
  • Surgical procedures
  • Family Planning

The provider, Old Town Surgery, is registered with the Care Quality Commission as a single-handed practice. The single handed GP is male, and there are four salaried GPs (two female, two male), and one locum GP (male). The nursing team includes a practice nurse, a triage nurse and a healthcare assistant. A clinical pharmacist is also employed (for one-and-a-half days per week) by the practice. The non-clinical management team is concerned with the day-to-day running of the practice and consists of a practice manager, a finance manager, and two office managers. The non-clinical team is completed by seven receptionists and two secretaries.

Old Town Surgery is open from 8am to 6.30pm, Monday to Friday, and the practice will take calls for routine and urgent GP appointments during these times. Extended hours evening appointments are available from 6.30pm to 7.30pm on Tuesday and Thursday. The main telephone line is not answered for one hour at lunchtimes from 12.30pm to 1.30pm. A recorded message provides a phone number in case the caller has an emergency during this time.

The practice has opted out of providing Out-Of-Hours services to its own patients. Outside of normal practice hours, patients can access the NHS 111 service, and an Out-Of-Hours GP is available at Swindon Walk-In Centre. Information about the Out-Of-Hours service was available on the practice website, in the patient registration pack, and as an answerphone message.

Overall inspection

Good

Updated 13 March 2019

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Old Town Surgery on 8 February 2019, as part of our inspection programme. The service was previously inspected on 16 July 2016, and rated Good overall.

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 overall.

This means that:

  • Patients had good outcomes because they received effective care and treatment that met their needs.
  • Patients were supported, treated with dignity and respect and were involved as partners in their care.
  • People’s needs were met by the way in which services were organised and delivered.
  • The leadership, governance and culture of the practice promoted the delivery of high quality person-centred care.
  • The practice had a well-engaged and active patient participation group (PPG) who made suggestions for improvements, and met regularly (monthly) with practice staff and other stakeholder organisations such as the local clinical commissioning group (CCG) and Healthwatch. The practice and its PPG organised a twice-yearly series of presentations on health matters that attracted an average audience of 65 attendees. The presentations covered such topics as diabetes education, men's health, and breast cancer awareness. We saw documentary evidence that the events were positively evaluated.

We found areas where the provider should make improvements. The provider should:

  • Continue to identify carers to enable this group of patients to access the care and support they require.
  • Continue efforts to increase the programme coverage of women eligible to be screened for cervical cancer.
  • Continue to engage patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and mental health problems, so that there is lower exception reporting and healthier outcomes for these indicators.
  • Continue to undertake audits for antibiotics, so that patients' use of these items is safely monitored.

Details o f our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence tables.  

Professor Steve Field CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP

Chief Inspector of General Practice