Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at The Lawns Surgery on 28 April 2015. The Lawns Surgery provides primary medical services to people living in Rustington, Littlehampton, East Preston and Angmering. At the time of our inspection there were approximately 2,000 patients registered at the practice with a team of a principal GP, a part time salaried GP, a practice nurse, a healthcare assistant, a small team of receptionists / administrative staff and a practice manager.

The practice has an overall rating of good.

The inspection team spoke with staff and patients and reviewed policies and procedures. The practice understood the needs of the local population and engaged effectively with other services. Specifically, we found the practice to be good for providing safe, well-led, effective, caring and responsive services.

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.
• Information about safety was recorded, monitored, appropriately reviewed and addressed.
• Risks to patients were assessed and well managed.
• Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered following best practice guidance.
• Test results were communicated with patients as soon as possible, usually the following day.
• 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.
• GPs printed out consultation notes for patients including medication information so that patients could review their care and treatment
• Medicine information including name of medication, dosage and reason for taking it was given to patients and where appropriate was printed in large text for those with visual impairments.
• Information about services and how to complain was available and easy to understand.
• Patients said they found it easy to make an appointment with their GP and that there was continuity of care, with urgent appointments available the same day.
• The practice was well equipped to treat patients and meet their needs.
• There was a clear leadership structure and staff felt supported by management.
• The practice proactively sought feedback from staff and patients, which it acted on.
• There were effective systems in place for the controlling the risk of infection. The practice was clean and hygienic.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

This practice is rated as Good overall. (Previous inspection April 2018 – Good)

The key questions are rated as:

Are services safe? – Good

Are services effective? – Good

Are services caring? – Outstanding

Are services responsive? – Good

Are services well-led? - Good

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at the Lawns Surgery on 27 April 2018 as part of our planned inspection programme.

At this inspection we found:

• The practice had clear systems to manage risk so that safety incidents were less likely to happen. When incidents did happen, the practice learned from them and improved their processes.
• The practice routinely reviewed the effectiveness and appropriateness of the care it provided. It ensured that care and treatment was delivered according to evidence- based guidelines.
• There was a strong ethos of providing a dedicated, personalised and individual service to patients.
• The GPs personally telephoned patients with blood tests results and contacted patients to checks on their well-being during the day and after hours.
• Patient feedback received during the inspection was overwhelmingly positive.
• National GP patient survey results for the practice were amongst the highest nationally and locally.
• We observed that staff involved and treated patients with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect.
• Patients found the appointment system easy to use and reported that they were able to access care when they needed it.
• There was a strong focus on continuous learning and improvement at all levels of the organisation.
• Despite the limitations of its small and outdated premises the practice staff worked well to provide a good service to patients.

We saw an area of outstanding practice :-

• We received 40 CQC comments cards asking patients what they thought about the practice. Feedback from patients was overwhelmingly and consistently positive about the way staff treated them. The GPs were described as caring, compassionate, thorough and dedicated and there was a high level of personal praise for the dedication and individualised care provided to patients by the principal GP. The service was described as “incredible”, “exceptional” and “exemplary”. It was clear that they thought staff at the practice ‘went the extra mile’ and the care they received exceeded expectations. The GPs took blood from patients during consultations when required and personally contacted them with the results even if this meant phoning out of usual working hours and at weekends. Feedback from patients showed how much they valued the personalised care and attention they received in this respect.

Professor Steve Field CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGPChief Inspector of General Practice