Archived: Stow Surgery

Updated 2 March 2018

Stow Surgery is a small semi-rural dispensing practice providing primary care services to patients resident in Stow–on-the-Wold and surrounding villages and is part of the NHS Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group. The practice is currently going through the process of building a new surgery to improve the facilities for patients and to meet the demands of the local population.

We previously inspected this practice in November 2014 where they were rated as good overall and requires improvement for the safe key question. A focussed follow up inspection was undertaken in June 2015 where we found the practice had addressed the concerns identified at the previous comprehensive inspection in November 2014. We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Stow Surgery on 6 June 2017. The overall rating for the practice was requires improvement. This inspection was an announced focused inspection carried out on 30 January 2018 to confirm that the practice had carried out their plan to meet the legal requirements in relation to the breaches in regulations that we identified in our previous inspection on 6 June 2017

The practice provides its service to approximately 5,500 patients under a General Medical Services (GMS) contract. (A GMS contract is a contract between NHS England and general practices for delivering general medical services and is the commonest form of GP contract).

The practice partnership includes four GP partners whose working hours were equivalent to approximately three whole time GPs. Three GPs are female and one is male. The practice supports medical students and fully qualified doctors training to become GPs. At the time of our inspection, the practice was supporting two doctors training to become GPs. The practice employs three practice nurses, one health care assistant, one phlebotomist and two dispensers. The practice is supported by several office and administrative staff under the management of one practice manager.

The practice provides its services at the following address:

Well Lane,

Stow-on-the-Wold,

Gloucestershire,

GL54 1EQ.

Updated 2 March 2018

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Stow Surgery on 6 June 2017. The overall rating for the practice was requires improvement. The full comprehensive report on the June 2017 inspection can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Stow Surgery on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

This inspection was an announced focused inspection carried out on 30 January 2018 to confirm that the practice had carried out their plan to meet the legal requirements in relation to the breaches in regulations that we identified in our previous inspection on 6 June 2017. This report covers our findings in relation to those requirements and also additional improvements made since our last inspection.

.Overall the practice is now rated as Good.

Our key findings were as follows:

• Systems and processed had been improved to ensure the risks of infection in the practice were managed appropriately.

• Arrangements for managing medicines in the practice had been improved to minimise risks to patient safety.

• Arrangements to deal with emergencies and major incidents have been reviewed and implemented.

• Systems and processes had been reviewed and implemented to ensure staff had appropriate support, competency assessments, regular appraisal and training.

• The practice had reviewed their data in relation to patients who had been excluded from reviews and were able to provide assurance that patients were receiving appropriate reviews and monitoring.

• Systems to ensure that standard operating procedures in the dispensary were up to date and reviewed regularly had been improved.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

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Updated 2 March 2018