Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Knowsley Medical Centre on 27 May 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

Specifically, we found the practice to be good for providing well-led, effective, caring and responsive services. We found the practice required improvements for safe. It was also good for providing services for the populations groups we rate.

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

• Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise concerns, and to report incidents and near misses.
• Risks to patients were assessed and well managed.
• Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered following best practice guidance. Staff had received training appropriate to their roles and any further training needs had been identified and planned.
• Patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect and they were involved in their care and decisions about their treatment.
• Information about services and how to complain was available and easy to understand, with evidence demonstrating that the practice responded quickly to issues raised.

• Patients’ views on the appointment system varied. Many patients were happy with the system and found it easy to make an appointment with a clinician, with urgent appointments available the same day.
• The practice had good facilities and was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.
• There was a clear leadership structure and staff felt supported by management.

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

Importantly the provider must:

• Ensure checks are carried out on portable electrical equipment and calibration of medical equipment is undertaken.
• Ensure the recruitment and selection of staff is carried out in line with policies and procedures including Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks on clinical staff. Ensure checks are routinely carried out to ensure clinical staff are registered with their appropriate professional bodies.

In addition the provider should:

• Staff acting as chaperones should have access to appropriate guidance.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

We reviewed the information available to us about Knowsley Medical Centre on 17 April 2019. We did not find evidence of significant changes to the quality of service being provided since the last inspection. As a result, we decided not to inspect the surgery at this time. We will continue to monitor this information about this service throughout the year and may inspect the surgery when we see evidence of potential changes.