• Doctor
  • GP practice

High Glades Medical Practice

Overall: Good read more about inspection ratings

9A Upper Church Road, St Leonards on Sea, Hastings, East Sussex, TN37 7AT (01424) 754678

Provided and run by:
Sydenham House Medical Group

All Inspections

6 July 2023

During a monthly review of our data

We carried out a review of the data available to us about High Glades Medical Practice on 6 July 2023. We have not found evidence that we need to carry out an inspection or reassess our rating at this stage.

This could change at any time if we receive new information. We will continue to monitor data about this service.

If you have concerns about High Glades Medical Practice, you can give feedback on this service.

5 July2022

During a routine inspection

This practice is rated as Good overall.

The key questions at this inspection are rated as:

Are services safe? – Good

Are services effective? – Good

Are services caring? – Good

Are services responsive? – Good

Are services well-led? – Good

The full comprehensive report can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for High Glades Medical Practice on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

Why we carried out this inspection:

We carried out an announced inspection at High Glades Medical Practice on 5 July 2022 under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008, as part of our regulatory functions. The inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

How we carried out the inspection:

Throughout the pandemic CQC has continued to regulate and respond to risk. However, taking into account the circumstances arising as a result of the pandemic, and in order to reduce risk, we have conducted our inspections differently.

This inspection was carried out in a way which enabled us to spend a minimum amount of time on site. This was in line with all data protection and information governance requirements.

This included:

  • Completing clinical searches on the practice’s patient records system and discussing findings with the provider
  • Requesting evidence from the provider
  • A short site visit

Our judgement of the quality of care at this service is based on a combination of what we found when we inspected, information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services and information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

Our findings:

We have rated this practice as Good overall.

  • The practice’s systems, practices and processes kept people safe and safeguarded from abuse.
  • There were systems and processes to help maintain appropriate standards of cleanliness and hygiene.
  • Risks to patients, staff and visitors were assessed, monitored or managed effectively.
  • Staff had the information they needed to deliver safe care and treatment.
  • The arrangements for managing medicines kept patients safe.
  • The practice learned and made improvements when things went wrong.
  • Patients’ needs were assessed, and care as well as treatment were delivered in line with current legislation, standards and evidence-based guidance.
  • Staff had the skills, knowledge and experience to carry out their roles.
  • Staff treated patients with kindness, respect and compassion.
  • Staff helped patients to be involved in decisions about their care and treatment.
  • People were able to access care and treatment in a timely way.
  • Complaints were listened to and used to improve the quality of care.
  • The practice involved the public, staff and external partners to help ensure they delivered high-quality and sustainable care.

Notable practice:

  • The practice had initiated and held support group meetings for patient who were peri-menopausal or menopausal.
  • Specialist services had been developed for patients who were neurodiverse and the practice was being supported by the Primary Care Network (PCN) to develop these further and share awareness training across the PCN.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

  • Continue with plans to update all records of the monitoring of patients referred to other services under the two week wait system.
  • Continue with plans to improve hypnotics prescribing where required.
  • Consider revising practice systems to ensure that all prescribing of high-risk medicines continues to follow relevant best practice guidance.
  • Continue to act on and learn from all safety alerts.
  • Consider revising practice systems to ensure that all reviews of patients with long-term conditions continue to follow relevant best practice guidance.
  • Continue with plans to improve uptake of childhood immunisations and the cervical screening programme by relevant patients.
  • Continue to implement action plans and monitor improvements to patient satisfaction scores.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGP

Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care

Please refer to the detailed report and the evidence tables for further information.

31 January 2020

During an inspection looking at part of the service

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at High Glades Medical Practice on 22 and 23 January 2019. The overall rating for the practice was good. The full comprehensive report on the January 2019 inspection can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for High Glades Medical Practice on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

After our inspection in January 2019 the practice wrote to us with an action plan outlining how they would make the necessary improvements to comply with the regulations.

This inspection was an announced focussed follow-up inspection carried out on 31 January 2020 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 inspections on 22 and 23 January 2019. This report covers findings in relation to those requirements.

Overall the practice is now rated as Good.

The key question at this inspection is rated as:

Are services effective? – Good.

At this inspection we found:

  • The practice had made security improvements so that only authorised persons were able to access staff only areas of the premises.
  • We saw that all patient group directions were being kept up to date.
  • Medicines that required refrigeration were now being stored in line with Public Health England guidance at all times.
  • The practice had worked with the local Clinical Commissioning Group to reduce the prescribing of hypnotics.
  • The practice had made improvements to their performance (significantly so in some cases) when caring for patients with long-term conditions as well as patients with poor mental health.
  • The practice had enhanced systems so that they were able to identify and follow up children living in disadvantaged circumstances and who were at risk.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

  • Continue to reduce the prescribing of hypnotics where appropriate.
  • Continue to implement and monitor actions to improve performance for diabetes and hypertension indicators.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth MB BS BMedSci MRCGP

Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care

Please refer to the detailed report and the evidence tables for further information.

22 January 2019 to 23 January 2019

During a routine inspection

This practice is rated as Good overall.

The key questions at this inspection are rated as:

Are services safe? – Good

Are services effective? – Requires Improvement

Are services caring? – Good

Are services responsive? – Good

Are services well-led? – Good

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at High Glades Medical Practice on 22 and 23 January 2019 under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008, as part of our regulatory functions. The inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Health and Social Care Act 2008, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.

At this inspection we found:

  • There was an effective system for reporting and recording significant events.
  • The practice’s systems, processes and practices helped to keep people safe.
  • Risks to patients, staff and visitors were assessed, monitored and managed in an effective manner.
  • Staff had the information they needed to deliver safe care and treatment to patients.
  • The arrangements for managing medicines in the practice helped keep patients safe.
  • The practice learned and made improvements when things went wrong.
  • Performance for diabetes, asthma, COPD, hypertension and mental health related indicators for 2017 / 2018 was significantly below local and national averages. The practice demonstrated innovation in the way they were addressing performance issues. However, action was ongoing.
  • Published results showed the childhood immunisation uptake rates for the vaccines given were higher than the target percentage of 90% or above in all four indicators.
  • Staff had the skills, knowledge and experience to carry out their roles.
  • Staff involved and treated patients with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect.
  • Patients were able to access care and treatment from the practice within an acceptable timescale for their needs.
  • Results from the national GP patient survey showed that patients’ satisfaction with how they could access care and treatment was in line with local and national averages.
  • There were clear responsibilities, roles and systems of accountability to support good governance and management locally and at provider management team level.
  • The practice had a vision to deliver high quality care and promote good outcomes for patients. However, none of the staff we spoke with were aware of the vision.
  • There were processes and systems to support good governance and management locally and at provider management team level.
  • The practice was proactive at involving patients, the public, staff and external partners to support high-quality sustainable services.

The areas where the provider must make improvements are:

  • Establish effective systems and processes to ensure good governance in accordance with the fundamental standards of care.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

  • Revise the security of staff only areas of the practice to restrict access by unauthorised persons.
  • Continue to ensure all patient group directions are kept up to date.
  • Continue to implement and monitor the action plan in response to the monitoring of the temperature of refrigerators used to store medicines and consider introducing inventories of medicines stored at the practice as well as keep records of any audit checks.
  • Continue to work with the local Clinical Commissioning Group to reduce the prescribing of hypnotics.
  • Continue to implement and monitor the action plan to further enhance systems to identify and follow up children living in disadvantaged circumstances and who were at risk.

Professor Steve Field CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP
Chief Inspector of General Practice

Please refer to the detailed report and the evidence tables for further information.

06 December 2016

During an inspection looking at part of the service

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection of High Glades Medical Practice on 23 February 2016. Breaches of legal requirements were found during that inspection within the well led domain. The practice was rated as good overall, requires improvement in the well-led domain and good in the safe, effective, caring and responsive domains. After the comprehensive inspection, the practice sent to us an action plan detailing what they would do to meet the legal requirements. We undertook a focused inspection on 06 December 2016 to check that the provider had followed their action plan and to confirm that they now met legal requirements. The provider was now meeting all requirements and was rated as good overall and good under the well-led domain. This report only covers our findings in relation to those requirements.

During the previous inspection on 23 February 2016 we found that the areas where the practice must make improvements were:

  • To ensure that significant events are investigated and discussed thoroughly, actions taken and lessons learnt and disseminated and to ensure that the accuracy of recording of significant events and complaints is more robust.

This report should be read in conjunction with the last report from 23 February 2016. The report from our last comprehensive inspection can be read by selecting the 'all reports' link on our website at www.cqc.org.uk.

During this inspection we found that:

  • Significant events were seen to have been investigated and discussed thoroughly, actions were taken and lessons learnt. We saw that learning points were disseminated to staff and that the recording of significant events and complaints was accurate.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

23 February 2016

During a routine inspection

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at High Glades Medical Centre on 23 February 2016. Overall the practice is rated as good.

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

  • There was an open and transparent approach to safety. Staff were aware of their responsibilities to safety and reported significant events.

  • However, when there were unintended or unexpected safety incidents, we saw no evidence that reviews and investigations were thorough enough and lessons learned were not communicated widely enough to support improvement. We also saw some errors in accuracy in the recording of some significant events and also in the detail of recording some complaints.

  • Risks to patients were assessed and well managed.
  • 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 they were involved in their care and decisions about their treatment.
  • Information about services and how to complain was available and easy to understand.
  • Some patients said that they found it difficult to get through on the telephone to make an appointment first thing in the morning.
  • Appointments were available to book on the day.
  • The practice had good facilities and was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.
  • There was a clear leadership structure and staff felt supported by management. The practice proactively sought feedback from staff and patients, which it acted on.
  • The provider was aware of and complied with the requirements of the Duty of Candour.

The areas where the provider must make improvements are:

  • To ensure that significant events are investigated and discussed thoroughly, actions taken and lessons learnt and disseminated and to ensure that the accuracy of recording of significant events and complaints is more robust.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

  • To investigate why the percentage of patients with hypertension in whom the last blood pressure reading measured in the preceding 12 months is 150/90mmHg or less is lower than the national and local average and action ways to rectify this.

  • To survey, and act upon patient feedback with regard to access to services. This should include telephone access to appointments, considering ways to increase access to the patients’ clinician of choice and whether there is a need for any extended hours access for patients that can’t attend during normal surgery hours.

  • To make more health promotion advice and information on services available in the waiting room.

  • To ensure that all policies are marked with the practice name, signed and dated.

  • To consider obtaining written consent when carrying out joint injections.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice