Archived: Parkhall Surgery

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Parkhall Surgery on 18 May 2016. Overall the practice is rated as good.

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

• Patients expressed high levels of satisfaction with the practice, citing caring and attentive staff, availability of appointments and being involved in decisions about their treatment as the reasons. Figures from the national GP survey stated that 92% of patients would recommend the surgery to someone new in the area.

• We received exceptionally good feedback about the GPs from the managers of two care homes the practice supported. They told us that the practice’s GPs provided and effective and responsive service to their residents, and were always available for advice and guidance when needed.
• The practice performed well in relation to many local and national performance indicators including those for screening rates, the NHS GP survey and antibiotic prescribing.
• Staff clearly enjoyed their work citing good support, training and teamwork as the reason.
• There was an open and transparent approach to safety and effective systems were in place to report and record significant events which enabled learning to be shared.
• The practice worked closely with other health and social care teams, and local community services to deliver co-ordinated and effective care for patients.
• The practice had good facilities and was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.
• Staff assessed patients’ needs and delivered care in line with current evidence based guidance. Patients’ long-term conditions were managed well, and they received regular health checks and medicines reviews.
• The practice had an active patient participation group that it worked closely with to improve its services.

The areas where the provider must make improvement are:

• Introduce an audit trail for prescription pads and computer forms so that they can monitor their use in line with national guidance.

The areas where the provider should make improvement are:

• Implement a formal system to disseminate NICE guidance and ensure all clinicians are aware of any updates.

• Ensure that dispensary staff are supported to keep up to date, and that they are regularly assessed as competent to carry out their role.
• Establish an effective process for monitoring the quality of the dispensing process including reviewing errors and near misses for learning.

Professor Steve Field CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGPChief Inspector of General Practice