SpaMedica Poole

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• Overview
• Assessing needs
• Delivering evidence-based care and treatment
• How staff, teams and services work together
• Supporting people to live healthier lives
• Monitoring and improving outcomes
• Consent to care and treatment

This means we looked for evidence that people’s care, treatment and support achieved good outcomes and promoted a good quality of life, based on best available evidence.

At our last assessment we rated this key question outstanding. At this assessment the rating has changed to good.

We have not awarded this service a score for Effective.

Find out about when we will not publish a key question score and what we look at when we assess Effective.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service made sure people’s care and treatment was effective by assessing and reviewing their health, care, wellbeing and communication needs with them.

Patients were involved in assessing their needs and were supported to participate in decisions about their care where required. Care plans reflected the needs identified through the assessment process. The service did not accept bariatric patients or patients who required sedation. These patients were supported at other SpaMedica locations and attendance was coordinated through head office.

The service ensured patients could access care, treatment and support when they needed to and in a way which worked for them. Bookings for the service were managed centrally by the provider. This ensured patients could attend the service best suited to their needs and location. If there were any particular patient needs, this was stated on the referral and head office used this information to plan for their procedure.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service planned and delivered people’s care and treatment with them, including what was important and mattered to them. They did this in line with legislation and current evidence-based good practice and standards.

The provider had systems to ensure care and treatment followed the most up to date national and international best practice guidelines issued by professional and industry bodies. These included the Royal College of Ophthalmologists (RCOphth), the World Health Organisation (WHO), and the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).

Staff followed up-to-date policies to plan and deliver high quality care according to best practice guidelines and national guidance. The provider and service had processes to manage and review policies and procedures to make sure they were up to date. Evidence-based care and treatment was filtered through the governance meetings and shared with staff at team meetings.

The location submitted information to the National Ophthalmic database (NOD) records. This audit compared multiple areas to help measure and protect patient safety and professional standards.

Patients were supported to maintain nutrition and hydration, with staff ensuring they had enough to eat and drink to meet their needs. Water coolers and hot drink facilities were available in both patient waiting areas. Water and biscuits were also available for patients to help themselves to pre- and post-surgery. We saw staff checking on patients and making hot drinks for them and family members.

The provider was committed to supporting long-term sustainability of eye care services through high quality education, surgical training and workforce development. The service offered external clinicians a surgical training programme, which supported NHS trainee ophthalmic surgeons’ professional development by gaining meaningful, progressive surgical experience within a high-volume, highly governed setting.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service worked well across teams and services to support people. They made sure people only needed to tell their story once by sharing their assessment of needs when people moved between different services.

The provider worked with all locations to maximise efficiency and reduce waiting times to benefit patients. Patients could be seen across other SpaMedica sites if this was their preference as bookings were managed centrally. Leaders and staff worked together across locations to ensure safe levels of staffing and oversight were maintained.

Teams and services worked well together to share information to assess, plan and deliver patient care, treatment and support effectively. All relevant staff worked collaboratively to meet the patients’ needs. All patients who needed surgery underwent a pre-operative assessment to ensure they had all the information they needed and were fit to proceed with surgery.

Staff held multidisciplinary meetings to discuss patients and their needs. A huddle meeting took place prior to surgery where any specific patient risks and plans to mitigate these risks were communicated with the whole team. We saw the huddle included a range of staff from the multi-disciplinary team. We observed the surgeons, nurses and trainee staff work together to make sure patients received an efficient service.

The provider has oversight of quality across all sites and worked with leaders to share data, learning, best practice and drive improvements. Staff said they had regular team and hospital meetings and information shared by the hospital manager. We reviewed previous minutes from team meetings and weekly updates and these included information about updated procedures, learning from incidents, inclusion events and safety alerts.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service supported people to manage their health and wellbeing to maximise their independence, choice and control. The service supported people to live healthier lives and where possible, reduced their future needs for care and support.

Staff provided relevant information promoting healthy lifestyles and support to patients on an individual basis. The service had a health and wellbeing information board where patients could access information on healthy habits for wellbeing, nutritional advice and managing stress or anxiety.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service routinely monitored people’s care and treatment to continuously improve it. They ensured that outcomes were positive and consistent, and that they met both clinical expectations and the expectations of people themselves.

Managers and staff carried out a comprehensive programme of repeated audits to monitor improvement and outcomes. The hospital carried out audits in line with the organisation’s audit schedule. We saw there was a clear escalation process for when audit results did not meet the expected target, and associated action plans to improve when this did occur.

Staff monitored the effectiveness of care and treatment, using outcomes and feedback to drive improvements and deliver positive outcomes for patients. The provider submitted data to the Royal College of Ophthalmologists’ National Ophthalmology Database (NOD) audit. Data received showed the service had a lower post-operative complication rate (posterior capsule rupture rate) of 0.49% compared to a national average of 0.70%. The service collated and reviewed comparative complications and infection rates for individual surgeons.

Patients spent time under observation until clinical staff were satisfied it was safe for them to leave, and the patient felt comfortable doing so. Staff provided post-operative instructions to each patient to make sure they recovered quickly and safely. Patients said to us they felt staff were supportive to them.

Patients reported on the outcomes of their surgery. The service gathered information postoperatively to see if patients were happy with their outcomes. Between June 2025 and June 2026, 11 patients out of 4269 required further treatment. Any issues were addressed immediately with the individual surgeon and extra support provided when needed. A patient survey from June 2025 to June 2026 demonstrated that patients were overall happy with their outcomes following surgery. Thank you cards received from patients were shared with the team sharing their positive experience.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service told people about their rights around consent and respected these when delivering person-centred care and treatment.

Staff made sure patients received information about their care and treatment in a way they could understand and consented to treatment based on all the information available. Staff had the skills and knowledge and took all practical steps to enable patients to make their own decisions. Patients understood their condition, care and treatment options (including any associated risks and benefits) and any advice provided. Staff obtained consent from patients for their care and treatment in line with legislation and guidance. The service had a policy for consent which was under review. The service audited the completion of consent forms; we saw that the most recent consent audit had a compliance rate of 96%.

Staff understood how and when to assess whether a patient had the capacity to make decisions about their care. There was a policy that guided staff to assess mental capacity and an effective management flow chart for staff to follow where a lack of capacity was suspected. Staff did not assume patients lacked capacity to make decisions based on a particular medical condition or disability.