Archived: Dr Pal & Partners Also known as The Parks Medical Practice

Updated 6 August 2015

Dr Pal and Partners (The Parks Medical Practice) has 6,112 registered patients and is part of Oldham Clinical Commissioning Group.

There are two male GPs, a senior partner and a partner, and one salaried female GP working at the practice. The practice staff include two practice nurses, a family planning nurse and a health care assistant. The practice manager supports an administration / reception team which comprises of eight administrative staff, one secretary, two supervisors and one administrative manager.

The practice delivers commissioned services under the General Medical Services contract.

Surgery opening hours are:

Monday 8.00am - 8.00pm

Tuesday 8.00am - 8.00pm

Wednesday 8.00am - 6.30pm

Thursday 8.00am – 8.00pm

Friday 8.00am - 6.30pm

If patients call the practice when it was closed, an answerphone message gives the telephone number they should ring depending on the circumstances. Information on the out-of-hours service was provided to patients.

Information about appointments was available to patients on the practice website. This includes how to arrange urgent appointments and home visits and how to book appointments through the website.

Updated 6 August 2015

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out a comprehensive inspection of Dr Pal and Partners (The Parks Medical Practice)

on 17 March 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

Specifically, we found the practice to be good for providing effective, caring, responsive and well led services. It requires improvement for providing safe services. It was good for providing services for all the population groups we assessed.

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

• Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise and raise concerns.
• Information about safety was recorded, monitored, appropriately reviewed and addressed.
• The practice had systems to manage and review risks to vulnerable children, young people and adults. Staff were trained on safeguarding patients from abuse and harm.
• Medicines were stored securely and stocks were well organised.
• On the day of the inspection the practice was clean, tidy and well organised. Staff reported high standards of cleanliness were provided at all times and problems are dealt with promptly.
• Staff were trained in basic life support skills so they knew what to do in the event of an emergency.
• Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered following best practice guidance.
• Staff received training appropriate to their roles.
• Most 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.
• Generally patients said they found it easy to make an appointment with a named GP with urgent appointments available the same day.
• Longer appointments were also available for patients who needed them including those with long-term conditions.

However, there were also areas of practice where the provider needs to make improvements.

Importantly, the provider must:

• Ensure a Disclosure and Barring Scheme check is completed for all staff who act as a chaperone.
• Ensure full pre-employment checks are completed, including Disclosure and Barring Scheme checks, prior to staff being employed to ensure they are suitable for their role.

There were also areas of practice where the provider needs to make improvements. In addition the provider should:

• Ensure detailed records are kept when reviewing significant events to show what action was taken as a result of the review or if the issue was reviewed later.
• Ensure left over medicines are returned to the supplying pharmacist for the purpose of auditing and monitoring.
• Ensure a spills kit is available to ensure the prevention of cross infection.
• Ensure an infection control audit is completed to assess and monitor the standards of cleanliness in the building.
• Ensure a more robust appraisal system needs to be implemented to ensure staff have the formal support and supervision they need to carry out their work.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

Updated 6 August 2015

The practice is rated as good for the care of people with long term conditions. An annual review of patients care needs was completed. A multi-disciplinary approach to care was in place and referrals to secondary care services for chronic long term conditions was made. Home visits were offered to patients who were unable to attend the surgery, for acute health problems, annual reviews, blood tests, general checks and vaccinations. The practice maintained a palliative care register to identify a patient’s prognosis in line with the Gold Standard Framework for advanced care planning.

Updated 6 August 2015

The practice is rated as good for the care of families, children and young people. Nursing staff encouraged parents / carers to attend childhood assessments/vaccinations clinics and worked alongside other health professionals to inform parents / carers about the importance of attendance. Additional catch-up clinics were provided for patients who did not attend vaccination clinics first time around. Pre-natal and post-natal care and advice was given to expectant mothers. All children under five were offered an appointment on the day they contacted the surgery. Sexual health/family planning clinics were available with a named GP. A community paediatric nurse provided advice and information to parents on preventing avoidable admissions to hospital and care to children with illnesses such as asthma, eczema. Clinical staff liaised with health visitors, school nurses and other healthcare agencies to support parents and carers.

Updated 6 August 2015

The practice is rated as good for the care of older people. The practice offered flu and shingles vaccinations Home visits were offered to patients who were unable to attend the surgery for acute health problems, annual reviews, blood tests and general checks. A named GP’s was provided for all patients over the age of 75. The practice had developed an effective system for medicine reviews for patients who were prescribed multiple medicines to ensure that medicines were taken as prescribed and side effects were monitored. Referrals to secondary care services were made for patients with chronic long term conditions. Information was given to older people and their carers about outside support services such as Age UK. The practice prioritised end of life care for older patients ensuring they received prompt treatment and advice.

Updated 6 August 2015

The practice is rated as good for the care of working age people (including those recently retired and students). Appointments were available until 8pm three days a week. NHS health checks were offered to patients over the age of 40 and a well women and well man health checks were available for patients who did not fall into this category.

Updated 6 August 2015

The practice is rated as good for the care of people experiencing poor mental health (including dementia). The practice provided annual checks for patients suffering from mental health issues such as depression and Alzheimer’s disease. Whenever possible these patients were seen on the day they contacted the surgery or were given telephone advice with a GP or clinician. There was screening to detect early dementia and referrals to other services were made as appropriate. Support was offered to relatives and carers of patients with mental health issues such as providing information about outside agencies for benefits and care provision. Carers were identified through new registrations and informing the practice staff they were carers.

Updated 6 August 2015

The practice is rated as good for the care of people whose circumstances may make them vulnerable. Patients with a learning disability were offered an annual health check. Whenever possible staff ensured that these patients were seen on the day they contacted the surgery or were given telephone advice with a clinician or GP. Patients and their relatives or carers were given information about support agencies when necessary. One of the GPs had overall responsibility for vulnerable adults safeguarding matters which ensured safeguarding matters were managed and monitored properly. The practice ran a substance misuse clinic for both registered and non-registered patients. A specialist drug counsellor wais available to provide assessments, care plans and prescribing of interventions such as Methadone.