Archived: Cloisters Medical Practice

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Cloisters Medical Practice on 20 February 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

Specifically, we found the practice to be good for providing safe, responsive, effective, caring and

well- led services. It was also good for providing services for the older people, people with long-term conditions, families, children and young people, the working age population and those recently retired, people in vulnerable circumstances and people experiencing poor mental health.

Our key findings across all the areas we inspected were as follows:

• Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise concerns, and to report incidents and near misses. Information about safety was recorded, monitored, appropriately reviewed and addressed.
• Risks to patients were assessed and well managed.
• Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered following best practice guidance.
• Staff had received training appropriate to their roles, with the exception of infection control and prevention. Further staff training needs had been identified and planned.
• Patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect and they were involved in their care and decisions about their treatment.
• Information about services and how to complain was available and easy to understand.
• Patients said that they did not always find it easy to make an appointment with a named GP however urgent appointments were available the same day.
• The practice had good facilities and was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.
• There was a clear leadership structure and staff felt supported by management. The practice proactively sought feedback from staff and patients, which it acted on.

We saw one area of outstanding practice:

• The practice provided a service to a community of people who lived on houseboats and barges. The practice offered them the opportunity to register as permanent or temporary patients and ensured that they had the means to contact and communicate with them when needed.

However there was one area of practice where the provider needs to make improvements.

Action the provider SHOULD take to improve::

Ensure that all staff receive infection control training.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice