Frome Valley Medical Centre, Somerset rated as Outstanding by Care Quality Commission

Published: 13 August 2015 Page last updated: 12 May 2022
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The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has found the quality of care provided by Frome Valley Medical Centre in Bristol to be Outstanding following an inspection carried out in April 2015.

Inspectors found that the surgery was providing a safe, effective and well-led service that was caring and responsive to the needs of the local community.

Frome Valley Medical Centre provides a primary medical service to patients living in and around the area of Frampton Cotterell.

A full report of the inspection has been published today: www.cqc.org.uk/location/1-583065605.

Ruth Rankine, Deputy Chief Inspector of General Practice for the South, said:

"We found that Frome Valley Medical Centre is providing an Outstanding service. Its successful outreach work for people in residential homes is of particular note as is its desire to support patients in developing their own skills and confidence to manage their own health.”

“The practice continues to drive improvements to services for its patients and the commitment for staff to improve is commendable.”

“The team working there led by the registered manager should be extremely proud of the work they do and it is for these reasons we have rated this service Outstanding .”

Linda Prosser, Director of Commissioning at NHS England South, said:

“This practice strives for excellence in patient care as well as professional standards and this ‘Outstanding’ rating by the CQC recognises their efficient, professional health care service which ultimately contributes to a wider healthier community.”

Under CQC’s new programme of inspections, all GP practices in England are being given a rating according to whether they are safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led.

The report on the Frome Valley Medical Centre highlights a number of areas of outstanding practice, including:

  • Winning two awards for clinical innovation for a project for frequent attenders which resulted in increased patient satisfaction and reduced referrals to secondary care and GP consultations. The project has been taken on as a clinical trial by a local university.
  • Using the BATHE (Background, Affect, Trouble, Handling, Empathy) programme during consultations to help patients learn skills and develop confidence to manage their own health.
  • The practice had proactively engaged with safeguarding concerns and changed working practice in order to identify potential abuse early in residential homes. This included a falls policy which had reduced the number of patient falls by 100%.

Ends

For further information please contact CQC Regional Engagement Manager John Scott on 07789 875809 or, for media enquiries, call the press office on 020 7448 9401 during office hours. Journalists wishing to speak to the press office outside of office hours can find out how to contact the team here. (Please note: the duty press officer is unable to advise members of the public on health or social care matters).

For general enquiries, please call 03000 61 61 61.

Find out more

Read reports from our checks on the standards at Frome Valley Medical Centre.

About the Care Quality Commission

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the independent regulator of health and social care in England.

We make sure health and social care services provide people with safe, effective, compassionate, high-quality care and we encourage care services to improve.

We monitor, inspect and regulate services to make sure they meet fundamental standards of quality and safety and we publish what we find to help people choose care.