Victoria Infirmary

On this page

• Overview
• Assessing needs
• Delivering evidence-based care and treatment
• How staff, teams and services work together
• Supporting people to live healthier lives
• Monitoring and improving outcomes
• Consent to care and treatment

We looked for evidence that staff involved people in decisions about their care and treatment and provided them advice and support. Staff regularly reviewed people’s care and worked with other services to achieve this.

At our last assessment, we rated this key question as requires improvement. At this assessment, the rating has changed to Good.

This service scored 71 (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 made sure people’s care and treatment was effective by assessing and reviewing their health, care, wellbeing and communication needs with them.

Feedback from people using the service was very positive. People felt involved in any assessment of their needs and felt confident that staff understood their individual and cultural needs. Reception staff used digital flags within the GP care records system to highlight any specific individual needs, such as the requirement for longer appointments or for a translator to be present.

Clinical staff used templates when conducting care reviews to support the review of people’s wider health and wellbeing.

The service operated a triage system and followed escalation pathways to ensure patients received appropriate care in a timely manner. A downtime triage process was in place prior to the service closing at 8pm. Patients who needed assessing and further treatment were signposted to the local hospital or out of hours GP. Those who were stable were asked to return the following morning.

The service planned and delivered people’s care and treatment with them, including what was important and mattered to them. They did this in line with legislation and current evidence-based good practice and standards.

Systems were in place to ensure staff were up to date with evidence-based guidance and legislation. Clinical records we saw demonstrated care was provided in line with current guidance. The skill set for the emergency nurse practitioners was specific to the service and medical support was available from Leighton Hospital Emergency Department when needed.

There was some evidence that the service monitored and audited care and treatment to make improvements and demonstrate compliance with national guidance and best practice. However, these were not monitored consistently. For example, people who were referred onto other care and treatment services data was not continually collected to provide feedback to other services or consider service redesign.

There was no annual audit schedule in place for the service. In the absence of a planned schedule, some audits had been carried out to check patient records were completed appropriately.

The service worked well across teams and services to support people.

Staff had access to the information they needed to appropriately assess, plan, and deliver people’s care, treatment, and support. The service worked with other services to ensure continuity of care, including where clinical tasks were delegated to other services.

We saw examples where patients were referred to other services, advice was requested from public health, patients were transferred to the local hospital and investigations such as blood tests and X-rays were carried out.

A discharge summary was shared with the patients GP about the visit, treatment and follow up if required.

The service supported people to live healthier lives and where possible, reduce their future needs for care and support.

Staff we spoke with were aware of smoking cessation and other supporting services patients could be referred to if required.

The service routinely monitored people’s care and treatment records to continuously improve it. At the time of our assessment a paper-based system was in use. Paper records were checked monthly to ensure patients details, name of nurse, date of consultation, patient consent, if analgesia was suggested or given and if abbreviations were used.

Staff reported incidents where patients had attended the minor injuries unit and redirected patients who required a walk-in centre, GP appointment or emergency department.

We requested information from the provider to demonstrate how the service was monitored, and improvements were made. The provider told us they were reviewing the communication with other services to improve awareness of the service provided and ensure patients were directed to the most suitable service in the first instance.

Patients feedback for this service was all positive.

The service told people about their rights around consent and respected these when delivering person-centred care and treatment.

Staff understood and applied legislation relating to consent. Capacity and consent were clearly recorded. We saw evidence an advocate used for people with learning disabilities. No concerns were identified.