Saddleworth Medical Practice

Background to this inspection

Updated 24 August 2017

Saddleworth Medical Centre is located to the east of Oldham, approximately eight miles from the town centre. The area covers over 50% of the area of Oldham Metropolitan Borough. It is a rural area and comprises of several villages and hamlets.

Saddleworth Medical Practice has a main surgery in Uppermill, and a small branch surgery at Delph. Patients are able to book appointments at whichever surgery is most convenient.

The Delph Surgery is owned by the practice and was purpose built in 2014. It is opened during the morning Monday to Friday, and also on Friday afternoons. There is one receptionist/facilities manager based at Delph and other staff, including GPs and practice nurses, work between the two surgeries. The surgery is fully accessible to patients with mobility difficulties, but there is limited parking in the area.

The Uppermill Surgery is owned by NHS Property Services. This is also fully accessible, and there is a car park available.

There are five GP partners (one female and four male) and four salaried GPs (three female and one male). There are also six practice nurses, two healthcare assistants and a phlebotomist. The practice had recently employed a clinical pharmacist and a community matron. There was a practice manager and several administration and reception staff.

At the time of our inspection there were 14,530 patients registered with the practice. The practice is a member of NHS Oldham Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG). The practice delivers commissioned services under a Personal Medical Services (PMS) contract. The proportion of patients registered in the 40 to 79 age group is slightly higher than the national average, and there are slightly fewer than average patients in the 20 to 39 age group. People in the area have a higher than average life expectancy and they live in the least deprived decile.

There is an out of hours service available provided by a registered provider, Go to Doc.

Overall inspection

Good

Updated 24 August 2017

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Saddleworth Medical Practice on 12 May 2016. The overall rating for the practice was good, with a rating of requires improvement in the safe domain. The full comprehensive report on the May 2016 inspection can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Saddleworth Medical Practice on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

This inspection was an announced focused inspection carried out on 16 August 2017 to confirm that the practice had carried out their plan to meet the legal requirements in relation to the breach in regulation that we identified in our previous inspection on 12 May 2016. This report covers our findings in relation to those requirements.

Overall the practice is rated as good.

Our key findings were as follows:

All required pre-employment checks were being carried out.
The registration of clinicians with the appropriate professional bodies was regularly checked.

The practice is rated as good for the care of people whose circumstances may make them vulnerable.

This rating was given following the comprehensive inspection 12 May 2016. A copy of the full report following this inspection is available on our website. http://www.cqc.org.uk/search/services/doctors-gps

Latest inspection summary

On this page

Background to this inspection

Overall inspection

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP)

People with long term conditions

Families, children and young people

Older people

Working age people (including those recently retired and students)

People experiencing poor mental health (including people with dementia)

People whose circumstances may make them vulnerable