High Street Medical Practice - Winsford

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at High Street Medical Practice - Winsford on 4 November 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

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

• Staff assessed patients’ needs and delivered care in line with current evidence based guidance.

• Staff had the skills, knowledge and experience to deliver effective care and treatment.

• Patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect and that overall they were involved in decisions about their care and treatment.

• There were systems in place to reduce risks to patient safety for example, infection control procedures.

• Patients found it easy to make an appointment with a named GP and there was good continuity of care. Urgent appointments were available the same day.

• The practice had good facilities, including disabled access. It was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.

• There was a clear leadership and structure and staff understood their roles and responsibilities. The practice proactively sought feedback from patients and acted upon it.

• Complaints were investigated and responded to appropriately.

• The practice learned from events and complaints and used this learning to drive improvements.

• The practice made good use of audits and the results of these were used to improve outcomes for patients.

The areas where the provider should make improvement are:

• Ensure the policy and procedure for managing significant events is followed at all times. The practice should also consider putting checks in place to ensure that any learning from significant events has been embedded into staff practice

• Extend the training record to include all clinical and non clinical staff groups.

We saw one area of outstanding practice:

The GP lead for mental health had recognised that physical health could be poor for patients with enduring mental health conditions. The practice provided primary care to people living in a psychiatric unit and the practice had tailored care towards these patients by ensuring they received health screening and information about their health conditions.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice