Archived: GPEA Service, Fareham Hub, Fareham Community Hospital

This service is rated as Good overall. This was the first inspection of this service.

The key questions are rated as:

Are services safe? – Good

Are services effective? – Requires improvement

Are services caring? – Good

Are services responsive? – Good

Are services well-led? – Good

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at GPEA Service, Fareham Hub, Fareham Community Hospital, as part of our inspection programme. This was the first time we had inspected this service.

The service provides a primarily extended hours service (patients can access GP and nurse appointments and book in advance to meet their needs) to patients living in the Fareham and Gosport and South East Hampshire Clinical Commissioning Group area. The service also offers an out of hours service until 10.30pm when the out of hours service is handed over to another provider.

There was no registered manager in post at the time of the inspection. The service had appointed one and they were in the process of being registered with the Care Quality Commission. A registered manager is a person who is registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

During the inspection we collected 41 comment cards and spoke with two patients. Feedback from patients was very positive. Patients found the service to be convenient and helpful, especially those who were working and would have had to take time away from work for a GP appointment.

Our key findings were:

• Staff had the information they needed to deliver safe care and treatment to patients.
• The service learned and made improvements when things went wrong.
• Patients received coordinated and person-centred care.
• Staff treated patients with kindness, respect and compassion.
• The service organised and delivered services to meet patients’ needs.
• Patients were able to access care and treatment from the service within an appropriate timescale for their needs.

• Leaders were knowledgeable about issues and priorities relating to the quality and future of services. They understood the challenges and were addressing them.
• There were clear responsibilities, roles and systems of accountability to support good governance and management.

The areas where the provider must make improvements are:

• Assess, monitor and improve the quality and safety of services.
• Assess, monitor and mitigate the risks relating to the health, safety and welfare of service users

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

• Plan fire drills to improve staff awareness
• Continue with improved assurances in relation to emergency medicines
• Continue with processes to improve prescription stationery security
• Improve oversight of the waiting area for the monitoring of unwell patients
• Continue with processes to register the registered manager with CQC
• Improve frequency of staff meetings and ways of communicating with staff to ensure staff feel part of a team.
• Instigate a repeat prescribing policy
• Improve mentoring and development opportunities for staff
• Establish a system to provide assurance that locums, not employed in member practices, receive safety alerts and other updates.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGPChief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care

Our inspection team

Our inspection team was led by a CQC lead inspector. The team included a CQC Inspection Manager, a CQC team inspector, a GP specialist adviser and a practice manager specialist adviser.