Derwentside Healthcare Limited

Updated 10 June 2022

The provider of this service is Derwentside Healthcare Limited, which is a federation serving the needs of the population in the Derwentside area of County Durham. The Federation is made up of 12 general practices, with a population of 96,000 patients, spanning one Primary Care Network (PCN) in the County Durham Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG). Further details can be found on the provider’s website at www.derwentsidehealthcare.co.uk

Derwentside Healthcare Limited is currently providing additional hours from one site:

Tanfield View Surgery

Scott Street

Stanley

DH9 8AD

The additional hours are:

6.30pm to 8.15pm Monday to Friday

9 am to 1.15pm on Saturday.

The service provides appointments with GPs, advanced nurse practitioners or practice nurses. The staff are all employed by the 12 GP practices who make up the GP federation. The service also employs regular locums on a sessional basis. In addition, the provider employs an on-call manager and receptionist. Senior staff in the organisation had dual roles in the primary care network and the individual GP practice’s.

Updated 10 June 2022

This service is rated as Good overall.

The key questions are rated as:

Are services safe? – Good

Are services effective? – Good

Are services caring? – Good

Are services responsive? – Good

Are services well-led? – Good

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Derwentside Healthcare Limited on 9th May 2022. We carried out this inspection because Derwentside Healthcare Limited had recently registered as a new provider.

How we carried out the inspection

Throughout the pandemic CQC has continued to regulate and respond to risk. However, taking into account the circumstances arising as a result of the pandemic, and in order to reduce risk, we have conducted our inspections differently.

This inspection was carried out in a way which enabled us to spend a minimum amount of time on site. This was with consent from the provider and in line with all data protection and information governance requirements.

This included:

• Staff questionnaires
• Reviewing patient records to identify issues and clarify actions taken by the provider
• Requesting evidence from the provider
• Sending out and receiving questionnaires completed by staff working at the service
• A short site visit.

Our findings

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service on a combination of:

• what we found when we inspected;
• information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services; and
• information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

At this inspection we found:

• The service acknowledged its governance and quality assurance systems required further development and had employed staff to help improve this.
• The service had good systems to manage risk so that safety incidents were less likely to happen. When they did happen, the service learned from them and improved their processes.
• The service routinely reviewed the effectiveness and appropriateness of the care it provided. It ensured that care and treatment was delivered according to evidence- based guidelines.
• Staff involved and treated people with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect.
• Patients were able to access care and treatment from the service within an appropriate timescale for their needs.
• There was a strong focus on continuous learning and improvement at all levels of the organisation.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

The provider should continue to develop governance and quality assurance processes.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGP

Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care