We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Farningham Surgery (also known as Braeside Surgery) on 10 January 2019 as part of our inspection programme.

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service 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.

We have rated this practice as good overall and good for all population groups.

We found that:

• The practice provided care in a way that kept patients safe and protected them from avoidable harm.
• Patients received effective care and treatment that met their needs.
• Staff dealt with patients with kindness and respect and involved them in decisions about their care.
• The practice organised and delivered services to meet patients’ needs. Patients could access care and treatment in a timely way.
• The way the practice was led and managed promoted the delivery of high-quality, person-centre care.

Whilst we found no breaches of regulations, the provider should:

• Improve the processes for providing patients with information in relation to two week wait referrals.
• Continue with their plan to improve audit activity to ensure quality outcomes for patients.
• Continue with their plan to correspond with patients aged 16 years of age regarding consent and sharing of information.
• Improve the identification of carers to enable this group of patients to access the care and support they need.

Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence tables.

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

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced focused inspection at Farningham Surgery on 16 July 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

Specifically, we found the practice to be good for providing safe and well-led services.

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

• The practice had safe systems and processes to manage medicines, including processes to authorise staff to administer medicines. Staff were appropriately trained to administer medicines to patients.
• Recruitment checks were undertaken when staff were employed by the practice and information was documented on staff files.
• The practice had a system to undertake safety audits and a process to follow-up any identified issues or concerns.
• There were arrangements for risk management within the practice, which included a process to identify, assess and monitor risks on an on-going basis.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

A comprehensive inspection was undertaken at Farningham Surgery on 30 October 2014.

Overall, we found that the practice requires improvement.

We found that the practice offered a good level of service to all of the patient population groups who received services and our key findings included:-

• patients received an effective, responsive service that identified and met their needs
• that patients had good access to the services and GPs
• that the appointments system worked well and availability of appointments was good
• patients felt they were treated with respect and dignity
• that staff were helpful, kind and considerate to their needs
• that patient privacy and confidentiality was maintained.

However, there were also areas of practice where the provider needs to make improvements.

Importantly, the provider must:

• Review the arrangements for the management of medicines in relation to the authorisation of vaccines administered by health care assistants within the practice.

• Review the training undertaken by health care assistants to ensure it is appropriate to their role and in the administration of vaccines where they are authorised and directed to carry these out.

• Update and follow the practice recruitment policy to ensure all checks are in place when staff are employed at the practice.
• Review systems and processes for monitoring the quality and safety of the services provided, by undertaking regular audits, including infection control and premises checks and training audits, and take steps to ensure risks are identified, assessed, monitored and managed appropriately, including risks associated with legionella.

In addition the provider should:

• Review the record keeping arrangements used in the practice to record the actions taken by staff following the receipt of safety alerts.

• Ensure that accurate records are kept to identify which staff have attended safeguarding training and to what level.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice