Archived: Dr Klemenz Also known as Northern Road Surgery

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Dr Klemenz and Partners on 7 January 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

Specifically, we found the practice to be good for providing well-led, effective, caring and responsive services. It was also good for providing services to older people, people with long term conditions, families, children and young people, working age people, people whose circumstances may make them vulnerable and people experiencing poor mental health. It required improvement for providing safe services.

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, with the exception of those relating to Legionella.

• Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered following best practice guidance. Staff had received training appropriate to their roles and any further 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 they found it easy to make an appointment with a named GP and that there was continuity of care, with urgent appointments available the same day.

• 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.

However, there were also areas of practice where the provider needs to make improvements.

Importantly, the provider must:

• Review access to the repeat prescribing system and how it is used.
• The practice must ensure prescription pads which are completed by hand are stored securely and auditable records are kept.

In addition the provider should:

• Review how they manage expiry dates which change when medicines are stored at different temperatures.
• The practice should consider keeping records of how they responded to alerts including medicine recalls.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice