New Cross Health Centre

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at New Cross Health Centre on 6 December 2023. Overall, the practice is rated as requires improvement.

Safe - good

Effective – requires improvement

Caring – requires improvement

Responsive - requires improvement

Well-led – requires improvement

Following our previous inspection on 13 December 2016 the practice was rated good overall and for providing safe, effective, responsive, and well-led services. The practice was rated requires improvement for providing caring services.

The full reports for previous inspections can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for New Cross Health Centre on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

Why we carried out this inspection

This inspection was a comprehensive inspection to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008 to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

How we carried out the inspection

This inspection was carried out in a way which enabled us to spend a minimum amount of time on site.

This included:

• Conducting staff interviews using video conferencing.
• Completing clinical searches on the practice’s patient records system (this was with consent from the provider and in line with all data protection and information governance requirements).
• Reviewing patient records to identify issues and clarify actions taken by the provider.
• Requesting evidence from the provider.
• A site visit.

Our findings

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service on a combination of:

• what we found when we inspected
• information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services and
• information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

We found that:

• Cervical screening and child immunisations uptake were below the national target. However, there were robust recall systems and performance against these targets was continually reviewed and monitored.
• The practice performance for the patient experience indicators in the national GP survey was below the local and national average since 2019 and this had further declined in 2023 (except in one out of four indicators).
• Patients’ needs were assessed, and care and treatment were mostly delivered in line with current legislation, standards and evidence-based guidance. Still, there was room for improvement.
• The provider had a programme of clinical and non-clinical audits to improve patient care. That said, it was unclear how the information was shared with clinical staff.
• The practice's performance for the access indicators in the national GP survey was below the local and national average. However, the practice's patient survey results showed improved patient experience.
• Staff had received appropriate training and there were effective health and safety risk assessments.
• Staff spoke positively about leaders and felt supported.
• The way the practice was led and managed promoted the delivery of high-quality, person-centre care.

Although the practice leaders showed us evidence of improvement plans following the concerns raised, ratings are based on evidence at the time of inspection.

We found a breach of regulations. The provider must:

• Ensure that care and treatment is provided in a safe way.

Whilst we found no breaches of regulations, the provider should:

• Continue with efforts to improve uptake for cervical cancer screening and child immunisations.
• Take action to inform relevant staff of the clinical audits that have been carried out at the practice.

Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence tables.

Dr Sean O’Kelly BSc MB ChB MSc DCH FRCA

Chief Inspector of Health Care