England’s Chief Inspector of General Practice has placed a Birmingham GP practice into special measures following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission.
The Care Quality Commission has found the quality of care at LPS – The Surgery in Birmingham, West Midlands, to be Inadequate following an inspection carried out in March 2015.
A full report of the inspection has been published today.
LPS – the Surgery, also known as Cotterills Lane Surgery, is located in Alum Rock, Birmingham and has approximately 2700 patients registered with the practice.
Under CQC’s new programme of inspections, all of England’s GP practices are being given a rating according to whether they are safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led.
Whilst patients said they felt the practice offered an excellent service and staff were efficient, helpful and caring, the report highlights a number of areas where improvements must be made including:
- Develop the effective operation of system to analyse significant events and incidents and ensure learning is recorded, identified and shared with staff and contributes to improvements in service delivery.
- Ensure audits of practice are undertaken, including completed clinical audit cycles to monitor performance and demonstrate improved outcomes for patients.
- Ensure there are formal governance arrangements in place to regularly assess and monitor the quality of the services provided.
The provider must send CQC a report that says what action they are going to take to meet these essential standards. CQC will inspect the practice again in six months to consider whether sufficient improvements have been made and support the practice while it addresses the issues identified by the inspection.
Janet Williamson, Deputy Chief Inspector of General Practice and Dentistry in CQC’s Central region said:
“It is important that the people who are registered with LPS – The Surgery can rely on getting the high quality care which everyone is entitled to receive from their GP.
"Although the patients we met told us they were treated with dignity and respect, we also found that care and treatment was not always delivered in line with best practice.
“We know that LPS – The Surgery has acknowledged the areas where action must be taken. We have found significant areas of concern, which is why we are placing the practice into special measures – so opening the way to support from NHS England among others.
“We will continue to monitor this practice and we will inspect again in six months to check whether improvements have been made. I am hopeful that the practice will do what is required for the sake of its patients, but if we find that the service remains inadequate, we will consider taking further action.”
Ends
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Find out more
Read our reports on LPS – The Surgery.