The Village Practice

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at The Village Practice on 10 June 2016. Overall the practice is rated as good.

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

• The practice used innovative and proactive methods to improve patient outcomes and worked with other local providers to share best practice. The practice was committed to working collaboratively and worked closely with other organisations in planning how services were provided to ensure that they meet patients’ needs.

• The practice implemented suggestions for improvements and made changes to the way it delivered services because of feedback from patients and from the patient participation group (PPG).

• Feedback from patients about their care was consistently positive.

• Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise concerns and report incidents and near misses. There was an open and transparent approach to safety and an effective system in place for reporting and recording significant events. The provider was aware of and complied with the requirements of the duty of candour.

• Staff assessed patients’ needs and delivered care in line with current evidence based guidance. Staff had been trained to provide them with the skills, knowledge and experience to deliver effective care and treatment.

• Patients said they could make an appointment when they needed one and there was continuity of care, with urgent appointments available the same day.

• The practice had good facilities and was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.

• The practice had a clear vision which had quality and safety as its top priority and was regularly reviewed and discussed with staff.

• Staff were well supported and encouraged to access training to aid their career development. Staff morale was high and staff turnover was low.

We saw an area of outstanding practice including:

• A GP at the practice had developed an at glance guide to dealing with safeguarding concerns which meant staff could quickly and easily refer to guidance when they had a concern. This had been shared with and adopted by the CCG to disseminate to local practices.

However there were areas of practice where the provider should make improvements:

• Systems to ensure all policies are regularly reviewed and updated should be strengthened.

• Ensure practice literature on complaints clearly states which organisation patients can contact for support or who they can contact if they are not satisfied with the outcome of their complaint.

• Risk assess the level of Disclosure and Barring (DBS) checks for non clinical staff providing a chaperone service and reflect this in the practice policy.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice