Honeypot Medical Centre

On this page

• Overview
• Shared direction and culture
• Capable, compassionate and inclusive leaders
• Freedom to speak up
• Workforce equality, diversity and inclusion
• Governance, management and sustainability
• Partnerships and communities
• Learning, improvement and innovation

We looked for evidence that service leadership, management and governance assured high-quality, person-centred care; supported learning and innovation; and promoted an open, fair culture

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

This service scored 82 (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 had a shared vision, strategy and culture. This was based on delivering holistic, patient centred and personalised care, grounded in the principles of equity and tailored to the needs of their diverse local population. They were committed to learning, reflection and continuous quality improvement, shaped by patient and staff feedback. All staff had contributed to the development of the practice vision and strategy.

The service had exceptionally inclusive leaders at all levels who understood the context in which they delivered care, treatment and support and embodied the culture and values of their workforce and organisation. Leaders had the skills, knowledge, experience and credibility to lead effectively. They always did so with integrity, openness and honesty. All staff we spoke with told us leaders in the practice were approachable and responded to any concerns raised. All staff had received appropriate appraisals. We saw the leadership team worked with other practices in the primary care network and were engaged in the development of primary care services within the local area.

The service fostered a positive culture where people felt they could speak up and their voice would be heard. Staff were aware of how to raise concerns internally and externally. All staff knew of who the external and internal Freedom to Speak Up Guardians were.

The service valued diversity in their workforce. They work towards an inclusive and fair culture by improving equality and equity for people who work for them. Policies and procedures to promote diversity and equality were in place which included a Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Policy. The practice worked with staff to identify and implement appropriate adjustments where required. Cultural and religious occasions were acknowledged in how rotas and leave were managed. The practice organised social events for staff and the practice held an annual Christmas and New Year celebration.

The service had clear responsibilities, roles, systems of accountability and good governance. They used these to manage and deliver high-quality, sustainable care, treatment and support. They always act on the best information about risk, performance and outcomes, and share this securely with others when appropriate. Leaders and managers supported staff, and all staff we spoke with were clear on their individual roles and responsibilities. Managers met with staff regularly to complete appraisals and performance reviews. Staff could access all required policies and procedures. The practice held various regular meetings with staff. The practice clearly recorded any actions arising from these meetings and ensured they shared these with staff. On the day of the site-visit, we found no gaps in training or recruitment files for staff. We also found no gaps in emergency medicines or equipment and there were risk assessments for certain drugs which were not stored on site. This demonstrated an efficient system was in place for these checks.

All significant events and complaints we looked at had been actioned as according to the policies of the practice. Significant events had been categorised into themes which were then analysed in a Thematic Summary Report. The purpose of this was to identify recurring patterns, highlight areas of risk, and support quality improvement across the practice.
 

The service understood their duty to collaborate and work in partnership, so services work seamlessly for people. They shared information and learning with partners and collaborate for improvement. The practice was a part of Harrow East PCN and one of the partners was the PCN Clinical Director. Many services were centralised and delivered through the PCN hub, providing additional capacity, resilience, and operational support to member practices. This included coordinated call-recall functions, development of shared dashboards and support to enable practices to meet KPIs and performance targets for national, ICB, and locally commissioned services. They also held Children and Young People Joint Clinic, Monthly Diabetes MDT with Diabetologist and a Monthly Palliative Care Meeting.

The practice also supported a residential and nursing care home.The practice achieved a reduction in ambulance callouts and conveyances from their care homes throughout 2025-2026. This was achieved through a variety of initiatives that the practice developed and implemented. This included having weekly face-to-face care home ward rounds for each care homes with a dedicated care home GP, paramedic and care coordinator as well as a weekly remote care home clinic with a specialist practice clinical pharmacists to review patients' medications, including detailed structured medication reviews. The practice also allocated a GP specific time on a weekday evening to contact the care homes for any patients that they are concerned about with rising risk as well as a GP having dedicated time on the weekend to call each care home to ask about patients that the staff are concerned about. The practice provided dedicated education sessions for the care home staff to recognise early deterioration of patients' condition from their baseline. The practice were also part of a pilot which enabled care home staff to have access to the Universal Care Plan record.

These actions have resulted in the reduction of ambulance callouts and conveyances from their care homes.

The service focused on continuous learning, innovation and improvement across the organisation and local system. They encouraged creative ways of delivering equality of experience, outcome and quality of life for people. They actively contribute to safe, effective practice and research. This Practice carried out a weekly audit on their two-week wait cancer referrals which ran for over a year. The purpose of this audit was to confirm that every two-week wait referral generated was tracked from the moment the clinician made the decision to refer through to the point where the outcome was confirmed and, where a cancer diagnosis was made, a cancer care review was booked. The practice also carried out a two-cycle cold chain management audit to assess and confirm effective management of the cold chain at the practice. Actions were identified from the first cycle and completed before the re-audit.

The practice also carried out a Thematic Summary Report from significant events in the previous year which aimed at identifying recurring patterns, highlight areas of risk, and support quality improvement across the practice.

The practice carried out an Access Planning and Appointment Capacity Quality Improvement report which aimed at developing a rigorous, evidence-based methodology for planning and monitoring appointment access. As a result of this, the access planning system produced a set of operational improvements. As a result of the improvement report carried out, the practice were now able to consistently offer routine GP appointments within 5 working days and same day appointments for all patients with urgent needs on the same day.

Patients we spoke with from the Patient Participation Group (PPG) told us that the practice improved their telephone system as a result of feedback from them. The practice introduced a new telephone system which showed significant improvements in the number of calls answered compared to the old system in place. Data we saw, showed a higher percentage of calls answered within 1 minute, 3 minutes and 10 minutes in each month in 2025 in comparison to 2024.