Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Berry Lane Medical Centre on 1 December 2016. Overall the practice is rated as good and outstanding for providing responsive services. Our key findings across all the areas we inspected were as follows:

• The practice is situated in a purpose built health centre. The practice was clean and had good facilities including disabled access, translation services and a hearing loop.
• There were systems in place to mitigate safety risks including analysing significant events.
• The practice was aware of and had systems in place to ensure compliance with the requirements of the duty of candour. (The duty of candour is a set of specific legal requirements that providers of services must follow when things go wrong with care and treatment).
• Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered in line with current legislation.
• Patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect and they were involved in their care and decisions about their treatment.
• Results from the national GP patient survey showed that patient satisfaction was above local and national averages in all aspects of delivery of care.
• Information about services and how to complain was available. The practice sought patient views about improvements that could be made to the service.
• Staff worked well together as a team and all felt supported to carry out their roles. There was a low turnover of staff and all staff we spoke with appreciated the open culture of the practice and that they felt valued in their work and were treated as equals.

There were outstanding elements of practice including:

• The practice had identified the need for a full time nursing and residential home specialist nurse to avoid unnecessary hospital admissions and plan for good end of life care. This ensured a continuity of care for patients and support for their families. The practice specialist nurse had formulated a ‘stay at home template’ only for patients with DNARs in place that was signed by the patient where possible, carer, out of hours and the relevant GP to avoid any GP sending a patient unnecessarily to hospital unless the patient had experienced trauma.
• In addition, the practice specialist nurse had provided educational sessions for care homes. For example, advice on keeping elderly patients hydrated to avoid medical problems.
• The practice provided a minor injuries service responding to the needs of local farm workers and they had responded to the needs of patients in their rural setting by being open seven days a week.
• The practice acted on innovative suggestions from staff. For example, as a result of one member of staff’s suggestion, the practice had produced an induction pack for medical students which were sent to them prior to them attending the practice.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice