Patience Lane Surgery Also known as Dr Praveen Gutta

Updated 22 February 2024

Patience Lane Surgery, also known as Dr Praveen Gutta, is an NHS GP practice which provides primary medical care services to patients living in Normanton near Wakefield, West Yorkshire. We carried out an announced assessment of one quality statement, equity of access, under the key question Responsive at the practice on the 4 March 2024. We carried out the assessment as part of our work to understand how practices are working to try to meet peoples demands for access and to better understand the experiences of people who use services and providers. We recognise the work that GP practices have been engaged in to continue to provide safe, quality care to the people they serve. We know staff are carrying this out whilst the demand for general practice remains exceptionally high, with more appointments being provided than ever. However, in this challenging context, access to general practice remains a concern for people. Our strategy makes a commitment to deliver regulation driven by people’s needs and experiences of care. The assessment of the quality statement equity of access includes looking at what practices are doing innovatively to improve patient access to primary care, and sharing this information to drive improvement. Overall, Patience Lane Surgery is rated as good, and the key question of Responsive continues to be rated as providing a good service. We found that the practice had organised services to meet patients’ needs, and that these services were accessible to them. We saw that the practice had put in place measures to improve patient communication routes and overall accessibility. In addition, we saw that the provider worked closely with their Primary Care Network, and their local extended hours provider to increase the range of services on offer, and expand hours of operation when patients could be seen. The practice sought out and used feedback and other data and information to monitor and improve access to their patients.

Updated 22 February 2024

In the 2023 National GP Patient Survey, the practice’s data demonstrated that patient satisfaction with GP practice access was above national and local averages. 75.5% of respondents reported that it was easy to get through to someone at the GP practice on the telephone. This was higher than the national average of 49.6%. Since 2018 the practice had performed consistently above this national figure. This performance was supported by patient responses in respect of appointment times offered, the experience of making an appointment, and satisfaction with the appointment itself. All these satisfaction scores being above national and local averages. Results from the NHS Friends and Family Test (FFT) were reviewed, and we found them to be generally positive. The practice had received 75 responses in the previous 12 months, of these 69 showed overall satisfaction with the service, 3 were either neutral or didn’t have a view, and 3 were negative. We saw that the practice actively analysed survey results and patient feedback. In respect of the National GP Patient Survey, the practice had developed an action plan which sought to continue to improve patient satisfaction, and had implemented actions from this plan. Actions included the recruitment of an additional receptionist to support patient accessibility. We saw that issues related to access had been discussed with members of the Patient Participation Group (PPG), and suggestions from the group had been listened to and put into place. As part of our assessment, we also spoke with a member of the PPG, they told us that access was good, appointments were generally available, and that although telephone lines were busy at peak times, waits for telephone call answering were not overly long.