Optimax Laser Eye Clinics - Peterborough

Optimax Laser Eye Clinics Peterborough is operated by Optimax Clinics Limited and was established in 2006. The service is set over two floors and facilities include two reception areas, three consultations rooms, pre and post treatment areas, and a laser treatment room.

The service provides laser vision correction treatment under topical anaesthesia to adults only. If a patient required further care or surgery using anaesthesia or sedation, as an example, lens replacement surgery, patients were referred for private surgery to another Optimax Clinics Limited branch. If patients had lens surgery in another Optimax Clinics Limited branch, the Peterborough location provided pre and post-operative care. Patients are self-referring and are self-funded.

We inspected this service using our comprehensive inspection methodology. We carried out the announced part of the inspection on 15 November 2017, along with an unannounced visit on 22 November 2017.

To get to the heart of patients’ experiences of care and treatment, we ask the same five questions of all services: are they safe, effective, caring, responsive to people's needs, and well led? Where we have a legal duty to do so we rate services’ performance against each key question as outstanding, good, requires improvement or inadequate.

Throughout the inspection, we took account of what people told us and how the provider understood and complied with the Mental Capacity Act 2005.

Services we do not rate

We regulate refractive eye surgery, but we do not currently have a legal duty to rate them when they are provided as a single specialty service. We highlight good practice and issues that service providers need to improve and take regulatory action as necessary.

We found the following areas of good practice:

• Staff received a three-day induction and refresher training.

• Laser staff had additional training to ensure they were competent to perform their duties safely.

• Laser safety measures were in place and were monitored.

• Staff were competent to carry out duties allocated to them.

• The service managed staffing effectively and had processes in place to ensure that staff had the appropriate skills, experience, and training to keep patients safe and to meet their care needs.

• Staff members were positive about their working experience feeling supported, to be part of a team and had worked in the service for a number of years.

• The process for obtaining consent was in line with the Royal College of Ophthalmologists (RCOph) guidelines.

• The clinic was visibly clean and well maintained.

• Access to the service and booking appointments was easy.

• Interpreter services were available for patients whose first language was not English.

• The provider collected patient feedback and analysed this to make improvements/changes to the service.

• When informed of concerns throughout the inspections the service took timely action to mitigate risks.

However, we also found the following issues that the service provider needs to improve:

• We found the inside of the medication cupboard in the laser room was dusty.
• We found unlabelled medicine in the medication cupboard that did not show the name of the medicine or an expiry date.
• We found three single use instruments that were out of date.
• We found an identified risk that had not been properly assessed, monitored and reflected in the service’s risk register.

Following this inspection, we told the provider that it should make improvements, even though a regulation had not been breached, to help the service improve.

Heidi Smoult

Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals