Garforth Medical Practice

On this page

• Overview
• Kindness, compassion and dignity
• Treating people as individuals
• Independence, choice and control
• Responding to people’s immediate needs
• Workforce wellbeing and enablement

We looked for evidence that the service involved people and treated them with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect. Feedback we received from patients, and from patient surveys indicated that patients felt that the service was caring. Staff we spoke with told us that they felt their wellbeing was supported by the provider.

At our last assessment, we rated this key question as good. At this assessment, the rating remains the same.

This service scored 75 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

The service treated people with kindness, empathy and compassion, and respected their privacy and dignity. At both clinical delivery sites, we saw that the provider made rooms available to patients for private discussions about their health concerns, rather than raise this at the reception desk. Private rooms were also available for vulnerable patients for support meetings with members of social care. For wheelchair users there was a lowered reception desk at the Garforth site, and this was also planned for the Elwood Surgery on refurbishment. Although conversations could be overheard when patients were at the reception desk, the provider had tried to mask these from others by playing a radio. Respondents to the National GP Patient Survey said that they felt listened to, and had been treated with kindness. For example, 89% of respondents said that the healthcare professional they saw or spoke with was good at listening to them during their last appointment. This compared closely to the average patient satisfaction figure locally and nationally of 87%. The provider had a strong ethos of providing and supporting care to its most vulnerable patients through working with the local primary care network frailty team and local home care team. Staff we spoke with had a good understanding of guidance to ensure older children and young adults had input into, and control of their own privacy, confidentiality, and the amount of parental involvement in managing their health and care needs. The provider had measures in place to support those who had been recently bereaved. In addition, the provider coded details of lasting powers of attorney into the patient record, and had a policy in place to support this process. We saw that staff from the practice also supported local charities and, for example, had recently completed a step challenge which raised money for a dementia charity.

The service treated people as individuals and made sure people’s care, support and treatment met people’s needs and preferences. We saw that the provider had in place measures to support the needs of specific groups of patients, and that the communication needs of patients were met. For example, translation and interpretation services were available to patients who require it, and tailored care was delivered to transgender patients.

The service promoted people’s independence, so people knew their rights and had choice and control over their own care, treatment and wellbeing. We reviewed the National GP Patient Survey data from 2025 as part of our assessment, and saw 89% of people said they were involved as much as they wanted to be in decisions about their care and treatment during their last general practice appointment, this was in line with local and national averages. Continuity of care and patient choice in respect of the ability of patients to usually get to see their preferred healthcare professional was slightly above local and national averages with 46% of respondents reporting that they saw their preferred choice, compared to a local average of 38% and a national average of 40%. Any specific needs or requirements that patients had were noted on the patient record. This included communication needs and reasonable adjustments. Whenever possible patients accessing the service had a choice of appointment types such as face to face or via telephone. Reception staff and others had been trained in the principles of care navigation, and were able to signpost patients to services appropriate to their needs including advocacy and community-based services.

The service listened to and understood people’s needs, views and wishes. Staff responded to people’s needs and acted to minimise any discomfort, concern or distress. The provider used both care navigation and triage by clinical assessment to support their appointment processes. Staff we spoke with during the assessment clearly knew how to respond when a patient was in need of immediate or urgent attention. There were systems in place to support this, including the use of panic alarms, and availability of emergency equipment. We saw from our review of training records that staff had received basic life support, and sepsis awareness training.

The provider shared with us evidence of how it cared about, promoted the wellbeing of their staff, and supported and enabled staff to always deliver person-centred care. Staff we received feedback from were generally very positive about working at the practice. They told us that they felt supported in their role, and that relationships were sound. Several staff did however say that communication across the organisation could be improved, a viewpoint supported by a recent staff culture survey undertaken in May and June 2025. Leaders and managers had taken steps to recognise and meet the wellbeing needs of staff, which included participation in the Healthy Practice Programme. This 6-month support programme was open to practices in West Yorkshire, and aimed to improve the culture and communication within practice teams. We saw that initial work including a staff survey, and the identification of initial areas for work had already been undertaken, with both communication and wellbeing being seen as priorities. At the time of our assessment this work was ongoing, and improved communication routes including social networking apps were being considered. The provider had also established a practice social committee which consisted of clinical and non-clinical staff. It was allocated an annual budget of £1,500 and arranged such activities as Christmas celebrations, the recognition of key birthday milestones and other social and charity events. In addition to this staff had access to a wellbeing app that offered staff discounts and support for mental wellbeing. In-house we saw that 2 mental health first aiders were available to staff for additional support if this was required.