Archived: Percy Street

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out a comprehensive inspection of Percy Street on 5 March 2015.

Overall, we rated the practice as ‘requires improvement’. Specifically, we found the practice required improvement for providing safe and well led services but was good for providing effective, caring and responsive services.

Our key findings were as follows:

• Feedback from patients was generally positive; they told us staff treated them with respect and kindness;
• Most patients reported good access to the practice, with urgent appointments available the same day;
• Patients we spoke with told us they felt they had sufficient time during their appointment;
• Patients’ needs were assessed and care was planned and delivered following best practice guidance;
• Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise concerns, and to report incidents and near misses. Information about safety was recorded, monitored, reviewed and addressed;
• There was a clear leadership structure and staff felt supported by the management team. The practice actively sought feedback from patients;
• The practice did not have good infection control arrangements;
• Some out of date medicines were found at each of the three surgeries.

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

Importantly, the provider must:

• ensure relevant checks are carried out on staff, in relation to recruitment of new staff and existing staff’s professional registrations;
• ensure patients’ specimens are not stored alongside medicines and undertake a risk, assessment for the presence of legionella (a type of bacteria found in the environment which can contaminate water systems in buildings).

In addition the provider should:

• take action to ensure medicines are in date and the cold chain for storage of medicines requiring refrigeration is not broken
• carry out a risk assessment to determine whether the practice should have defibrillators available at each surgery;
• put appropriate arrangements in place to ensure medical consumables, such as single use needles and syringes are in date;
• clarify arrangements for managing the care of patients with long-term conditions who had not attended review appointments;
• review systems for assessing and monitoring the quality of the service provision and take steps to ensure risks are managed appropriately.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice