Updated 26 June 2025
We carried out an announced assessment of Barking Urgent Treatment Centre from the 9 June to the 5 August 2025. We carried out this assessment to review the changes made at the previous assessment in June 2023, where the service was found to be in breach of regulation 12 safe care and treatment, regulation 17 good governance and regulation 18 safe staffing and was rated requires improvement overall and in four key questions. At this assessment we have reviewed all the key questions for safe, effective, responsive and well led.
Barking Urgent Treatment Centre is an urgent treatment service available to anyone living or working in Barking and the surrounding areas in North-East London. The service provides treatment of minor injuries and illnesses and provides an initial assessment (streaming) service in order that patients are transferred to the right service either within the Urgent Treatment Centre or elsewhere. The service is not located by an emergency department, patients who require emergency care are transferred using the 999-ambulance service to Queens Hospital, King George Hospital or Newham Hospital.
The service is located on one level at Barking Hospital, Upney Lane, Barking, IG11 9LX and is accessible to those with limited mobility.
The urgent treatment centre is an NHS service for patients who walk-in, self-refer, or are referred by the NHS 111 service open every day from 8am to 10pm.
The service is delivered by Partnership of East London Cooperatives (PELC) which is a not-for-profit social enterprise delivering NHS integrated urgent treatment services (including GP Out of Hours and Urgent Treatment Centres), to more than two million people across East London and West Essex.
PELC provides doctors and initial assessment (streaming) staff to the service. Other clinical staff are provided by North-East London NHS Foundation Trust who subcontract nurse and health care support worker staff to PELC. Most of the clinical staff working at the service for PELC are either self-employed, bank staff (those who are retained on a list by the provider) or agency staff.
At this assessment we found:
SAFE
We looked for evidence that people were protected from abuse and avoidable harm and found the service had made improvements and had responded to the findings of the previous assessment. This included staffing, and clinical guardianship.
EFFECTIVE
We looked for evidence that staff provided patients with effective care and treatment, and advice and support. We found staff worked with other services to achieve this. Following the last assessment the service had made the necessary changes to improve the service.
RESPONSIVE
We looked for evidence that the service met people’s needs, and patients were able to easily access the service. We found at the previous assessment the service was not meeting its four-hour target as agreed with the commissioners to treat and discharge patients. At this assessment we found the provider had improved and had met the target of 98% and had achieved over 98.8% of patients being seen by a clinician within four hours during the last four months.
WELL LED
We looked for evidence that service leadership, management and governance assured high-quality, person-centred care; supported learning and innovation; and promoted an open culture. We found leaders had improved governance systems to provide oversight of staff competency and performance and developed patient engagement by including a patient representation on the Council.
Further commentary is provided in the quality statements section of this report.