Tiptree Medical Centre provides primary medical services for approximately 11,000 patients living in Tiptree and the surrounding area.
The regulated activities we inspected were: diagnostic and screening procedures, family planning, maternity and midwifery services, surgical procedures and treatment of disease, disorder or injury.
We found that there were systems in place to ensure patient safety. These included a business contingency plan in the event of a non-clinical emergency, structures for handling clinical emergencies, a clear medicines management system and, robust child and adult safeguarding processes.
The practice made use of best practice guidelines, learning from significant events analysis and national bench marking systems to provide effective care. They also developed systems, such as, monitoring uptake of child vaccinations and health promotion activities to improve patient outcomes and mitigate risks.
Most patients we spoke with felt involved in the treatment process and thought that staff had a good attitude. We saw reception staff dealing with difficult situations with empathy and respect.
There could be more robust systems in place to identify those patients who are also carers and to consider the impact that their medical history/treatment will have on them and those they care for.
We found that the practice was aware of the needs of the different population groups and tried to ensure that all population groups had equal access to services provided. However written information was not easily available in a variety of formats which may affect access for some groups of patients.
There were issues both historically and currently with access to appointments. However the practice had worked hard to try to resolve these and was able to show that changes they had made had positive outcomes for patients.
There was an audit structure in place but this could be more robust.
Patients and staff were able to raise concerns or make suggestions and we saw that these were investigated and action taken.