Updated 10 October 2019
We undertook a focused inspection of Acle Dental Surgery on 24 September 2019. This inspection was carried out to review in detail the actions taken by the registered provider to improve the quality of care and to confirm that the practice was now meeting legal requirements.
The inspection was led by a CQC inspector.
We undertook a focussed inspection of the practice on the 19 March 2019 under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 as part of our regulatory functions. We found the registered provider was still not providing well-led care and was in breach of regulation 17 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014. You can read our report of that inspection by selecting the 'all reports' link for Acle dental surgery on our website www.cqc.org.uk.
When one or more of the five questions are not met we require the service to make improvements and send us an action plan. We then inspect again after a reasonable interval, focusing on the areas where improvement was required.
As part of this inspection we asked:
• Is it well-led?
Our findings were:
We found this practice was providing well-led care in accordance with the relevant regulations.
Background
Acle Dental Surgery provides mostly private treatment to about 3,000 patients. It also provides some general dental and orthodontic treatment to children commissioned by the NHS. The practice opens on Monday to Thursday from 9am to 5pm, and on Fridays from 9am to 12.30pm. It opens till 7pm on alternate Monday and Wednesday evenings.
There is ground floor level access for people who use wheelchairs and those with pushchairs.
The dental team includes one dentist, a visiting orthodontist, a dental hygienist, an implant specialist and an endodontist. There are three dental nurses and one receptionist. The practice has two treatment rooms.
The practice is owned by an individual who is the principal dentist there. They have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated regulations about how the practice is run.
During the inspection we spoke with the principal dentist, one dental nurse and the receptionist. We looked at practice policies and procedures and other records about how the service is managed.
Our findings were:
The provider had taken sufficient action to become compliant with the breach for regulation 17 that we had identified in our two previous inspections of this practice.