Cherry Tree Surgery

On this page

• Overview
• Kindness, compassion and dignity
• Treating people as individuals
• Independence, choice and control
• Responding to people’s immediate needs
• Workforce wellbeing and enablement

We looked for evidence that the practice involved people and treated them with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect.

This is the first inspection for this practice since its registration with CQC. This key question has been rated as Good.

The feedback we received from patients during our assessment was overwhelmingly positive. Patients were treated with kindness and compassion. Staff protected their privacy and dignity. They treated them as individuals and supported their preferences. People had choice in their care and treatment. We also reviewed results from the National GP Patient Survey (2025) and saw that this was in line with or above local and national averages. We saw that responses to the National GP Patient Survey had been consistently good over previous years and that this had been recognised and formally acknowledged by commissioners of the service.

This service scored 80 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

The practice was exceptional at treating people with kindness, empathy and compassion and in how they respected people’s privacy and dignity. We received feedback from 21 patients as part of this assessment, and all contained positive comments regarding the care they received and interaction with staff. Words used to describe the practice included caring, dedicated, amazing and friendly.

Feedback received via the National GP Patient Survey (2025) was in line with or above local and national averages. For example, 95% of respondents reported finding the reception and administrative team at the practice helpful (local average 84%, national average 83%), and 92% of respondents reported that the healthcare professional they saw or spoke to was good at treating them with care and concern during their last general practice appointment (local and national averages 86%).

During our site visit we observed positive interactions between staff and patients. Staff spoke positively about patients during our interviews, undertaken as part of this assessment. We heard examples of staff supporting patients through social difficulties outside of their clinical care.

The practice always treated people with kindness, empathy and compassion and respected their privacy and dignity. For example, sympathy cards were sent to recently bereaved family members, this was followed up by a telephone call from the clinician last involved with the deceased patient.

The practice actively supported and promoted other local caring services. For example, the practice supported the local hospice by displaying information and materials around the practice to make patients aware of the services available and support fundraising.

Staff treated colleagues from other organisations with kindness and respect.

The practice had a proactive and positive culture of safety, based on openness and honesty. They listened to concerns about safety and investigated and reported safety events. Staff we spoke with, and received feedback from, were able to give examples of significant events, complaints and learning as a result of these. Information about how to raise a complaint was available on the practice website and in the practice. We found some issues with the complaints process. For example, we noted that the information on the practice website needed to be updated to make clear to patients that complaints could be directed to the practice in writing. We reviewed 2 complaints during our site visit and found that the responses did not include signposting to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) and the complaints policy contained out of date information. These issues were addressed during our assessment. We also found that there were dual systems in place for logging significant events, and it was not clear who had oversight of this process. We received evidence from the practice following our assessment to demonstrate that improvements had been made to streamline this process, this included a dedicated member of the administrative team leading on the process.

The practice promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing.

Staff proactively identified patients who acted as a carer and had a system to identify these on the clinical record. Staff helped patients and their carers to access advocacy and community-based services.

Feedback from the National GP Patient Survey (2025) was positive in relation to patient choice and involvement. For example, 94% of respondents felt they were involved as much as they wanted to be in decisions about their care and treatment during their last general practice appointment (local and national averages 91%).

When booking appointments, patients were able to choose whether they would prefer this to be face to face or telephone consultation.

The practice had a proactive and positive culture of safety, based on openness and honesty. They listened to concerns about safety and investigated and reported safety events. Staff we spoke with, and received feedback from, were able to give examples of significant events, complaints and learning as a result of these. Information about how to raise a complaint was available on the practice website and in the practice. We found some issues with the complaints process. For example, we noted that the information on the practice website needed to be updated to make clear to patients that complaints could be directed to the practice in writing. We reviewed 2 complaints during our site visit and found that the responses did not include signposting to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) and the complaints policy contained out of date information. These issues were addressed during our assessment. We also found that there were dual systems in place for logging significant events, and it was not clear who had oversight of this process. We received evidence from the practice following our assessment to demonstrate that improvements had been made to streamline this process, this included a dedicated member of the administrative team leading on the process.

The practice cared about and promoted the wellbeing of their staff and supported and enabled staff to always deliver person-centred care.

Staff we spoke with and received feedback from told us they were valued by leaders, and felt supported by colleagues.

Leaders had taken steps to recognise and meet the wellbeing needs of staff, which included the necessary resources and facilities for safe working. For example, additional staff had been recruited to support the administrative team due to increasing workload, the premises had been extended to increase clinical space and allow dedicated offices for members of the team.