The Ridge Medical Practice

Updated 7 February 2019

The Ridge Medical Practice is situated within a large modern purpose- built surgery located at The Ridge Medical Centre, Cousen Road, Bradford, BD7 3JX. The practice provides services for approximately 23,000 patients and is part of the NHS Bradford Districts Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG).

The provider is registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to provide the following regulated activities: diagnostic and screening procedures; treatment of disease, disorder or injury, maternity and midwifery services, family planning and surgical procedures.

The practice is a fully accessible for those with a physical disability. There is parking available on the site for patients, and a privately operated pharmacy is located within the practice building.

There are two branch surgeries, neither of which were visited on this occasion, having been inspected at our previous inspection. They are located at Wibsey Surgery,93 Smith Avenue, Wibsey, Bradford, BD6 1HA and Buttershaw Surgery, Royds Healthy Living Centre, 20 Ridings Way, Off The Crescent, Buttershaw, Bradford, BD6 3UD.

The practice population age profile shows that it is above the CCG and England averages for those under 18 years old (29% compared to the CCG average of 24% and England average of 21%). Average life expectancy for the practice population is 77 years for males and 81 years for females (England average is 79 years for males and 83 years for females). Information published by Public Health England rates the level of deprivation within the practice population group as one on a scale of one to ten. Level one represents the highest levels of deprivation and level ten the lowest. The practice population is a mixture of White British, South Asian and East European ethnicity in composition.

The practice provides services under the terms of the Personal Medical Services (PMS) contract.

Detailed

There are ten GP partners (seven male and three female). The registered manager is the Business Manager; a non-clinical partner. They are supported by 13 salaried GPs (three male and ten female). The remaining clinical team includes a pharmacist, nine advanced nurse practitioners, four extended role practice nurses, 8 primary care practice nurses and seven health care assistants. Most of these staff work part time. The clinical team is supported by a practice manager and dedicated access manager. There is a large reception and administration team. A total of 138 staff are employed across the organisation. The practice reception is open for enquiries daily from 8am to 6.30pm with consultations available throughout the day across all three locations. Pre-booked appointments for early morning appointments are available between 7-8.00am on Monday, Tuesday and Friday, and an evening surgery is available on Tuesday between 6.30-8pm.

The practice is part of the extended access service that provides GP, nurse, physiotherapy, health care assistant and voluntary sector service appointments between 6.30-9.30pm Monday to Friday and GP appointments at the weekend, between 10am and 1pm.

The practice website at offers online appointment booking and the ordering of repeat prescriptions. Out of hours services are provided by Local Care Direct and patients can access the provider via the practice telephone number.

The inspection rating relating to the previous inspection was on display within the building and was posted on the practice website.

Updated 7 February 2019

This inspection was an announced focused inspection carried out on 14 January 2019. This was to confirm that the practice had improved in the areas identified at an earlier inspection. We previously carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at The Ridge Medical Practice on 28 November and 5 December 2017. The overall rating for the practice was good, with a rating of requires improvement for providing responsive services. We told the provider they should:

• Continue to review, act on and improve patient satisfaction in accessing services at the provider and in their interactions with clinical staff. Patient satisfaction in these areas was below local and national averages and highlighted as an issue of concern in patient feedback during the inspection.

• Review how strategic policy and decision making is shared by the senior leadership team across the wider staff team and patient population. Some staff we spoke with spoke with described a lack of effective communication across the organisation. Patient insights into why non-GP clinicians were offered in place of a doctor was not widely understood in some of the feedback we received during our inspection.

The full comprehensive report for that inspection (published on 29 January 2018) can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for The Ridge Medical Practice on our website at .

Our judgement of the quality of care at this service is based on a combination of what we found when we inspected, information from the provider, patients, public, other organisations and our ongoing monitoring of data about services.

Our findings from the most recent inspection confirm that:

This practice remains rated as good overall and is also now rated as good for providing responsive services.

At this inspection we found:

• The practice had undertaken their own comprehensive patient satisfaction survey and consulted widely across their practice population. Results from this survey showed improvement against the most recent GP national patient survey against like for like questions and was twice the sample of the national survey.
• Focus group consultations had been held with hard to reach sections of the patient population to be assured that all voices were being actively heard.
• Additional resources had been invested into the telephone system that had improved the effectiveness of the appointment system. We saw that patient satisfaction had improved as a result.
• The practice had engaged with two other practices to understand how they had achieved high levels of patient satisfaction and applied the learning to their ongoing business and communication strategy across the staff team and patient population.
• The practice had trained staff in the care navigation model of care to direct patients to the most appropriate clinician or service.
• Patients who did not speak English were able to see an East European interpreter available at the main site every weekday morning or speak to a range of staff fluent in a range of commonly spoken South Asian languages.

Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence table.

Professor Steve Field CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP
Chief Inspector of General Practice

Updated 7 February 2019

Updated 7 February 2019

Updated 7 February 2019

Updated 7 February 2019

Updated 7 February 2019

Updated 7 February 2019