Woolpit Health Centre Also known as Dr Pearson & Partners

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 service involved people and treated them with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect.

At our last assessment, we rated this key question as good. At this assessment, the rating remains the same.

This service scored 75 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

The service always treated people with kindness, empathy and compassion and respected their privacy and dignity. Staff treated colleagues from other organisations with kindness and respect.

Arrangements were in place to promote patients’ privacy. National GP Patient Survey data reflected people felt listened to and were treated with kindness. Staff we spoke with understood Gillick competency and there was a process to ensure young adults had control over their own privacy and the amount of parental involvement in managing their care and support.

During the site visit we observed staff to be friendly and helpful with people in the waiting area at the reception desk. Arrangements were in place to support people’s privacy, for example at reception and during clinical appointments.

The service treated people as individuals and made sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. They took account of people’s strengths, abilities, aspirations, culture and unique backgrounds and protected characteristics.

National GP Patient Survey data regarding people being treated as individuals, demonstrated that people were involved as much as they wanted to be in decisions about their care and treatment. The percentage of people who felt involved in decisions about their care was above the England average.

Patients’ personal, cultural, social, religious and equality characteristics needs were understood and met. Reasonable adjustments were in place, for example, arrangements for staff members to support people who were digitally excluded to access the online appointment system. People’s communication needs were met to enable them to be fully involved in their care.

All staff were required to undertake training to improve their understanding of how to offer support to people. For example, they had completed reasonable adjustments, equality diversity and human rights, accessible information standard and learning disability and autism awareness training. They had also completed training in areas such as domestic violence and abuse awareness.

Information for people on the reasonable adjustments the practice could do to make accessing healthcare easier was contained on their website.

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

Staff helped patients and their carers to access advocacy and community-based services. There were systems and processes in place to promote people’s independence and choice over their care and treatment. Information was available at the service and on their website which advised people how to access a range of support groups and organisations. This information was also included for example, on a medicines delivery newsletter that was sent to housebound people across the Christmas period. The types of services included for example, support for people with mental health needs, carers and agricultural workers.People could self-refer to a range of services. The social prescriber was available to support people with their health, social and wellbeing needs.

The service listened to and understood people’s needs, views and wishes. Staff responded to people’s needs in the moment and acted to minimise any discomfort, concern or distress.

There was a system for appointment triage that ensured people with immediate needs had access to services. Staff we spoke with knew the process for referral to emergency support, including mental health crisis teams.

Staff told us they felt supported by leaders and could approach them at any time for advice and guidance. The service cared about and promoted the wellbeing of their staff and supported and enabled staff to always deliver person-centred care.

Staff told us they were valued by leaders. Leaders had taken steps to recognise and meet the wellbeing needs of staff, which included the necessary resources and facilities for safe working, such as regular breaks and rest areas. Staff told us they felt supported by leaders and could approach them at any time for advice and guidance. There was a monthly staff newsletter which detailed, for example, a Christmas jumper day for charity, sharing of information regarding training and updates and insights from different teams providing statistics of the amount of work they had achieved. The practice also had a staff survey requesting honest feedback to help shape and improve the practice.