Sheridan Teal House

On this page

• Overview
• Assessing needs
• Delivering evidence-based care and treatment
• How staff, teams and services work together
• Supporting people to live healthier lives
• Monitoring and improving outcomes
• Consent to care and treatment

We assessed 1 quality statement from this key question, Assessing Needs. We have combined the scores for this area with scores based on the rating from the last inspection undertaken in 2022, which was good. Our rating for this key question remains good. We found that staff and the organisation had a good understanding of the needs of their service users, and due to the nature of the service when they contacted patients, they involved them in decisions about their care and treatment, and provided them with advice and necessary support. We saw that the organisation had effective oversight of peoples care, and undertook regular audits which gave assurance regarding the care received by patients. The provider met regularly with stakeholders such as Yorkshire Ambulance Service, and the commissioners of the service to discuss performance, tackle any identified issues and improve services to better meet the needs of the service user population.

This service scored 75 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

Staff and senior managers had a good understanding of the needs of the patients who were referred into the service. Patient referrals carried information from NHS 111 which included details of the patient’s reported condition, a priority and a disposition, for example speak to a clinician or see a clinician. It could also include details of any special needs. We were told by the provider that they received a large number of referrals which had a high urgency categorisation (1-2 hours). When a referral lacked detail or a valid disposition it was decided as a safeguard to assign a high priority to it and aim to make patient contact within 1 hour. When undertaking triage and assessing need staff told us that they worked to defined protocols and pathways. If required staff were able to access language support from an external provider.

Call handlers and clinical staffed utilised protocols and approved templates when assessing patient needs. If staff required further clinical support and advice this was either available on site or remotely. We were told that this on occasion could take some time due to other demands on the clinical advisor. Outcomes for patients included advice regarding the management of their symptoms, booking into a Primary Care Centre (PCC) appointment or direction to Accident and Emergency Departments, receipt of a remote consultation, pharmacy and prescription support, a home visit or in an urgent situation, calls to emergency services. In May 2024 we saw that 67.4% of 24,368 patient contacts either received a PCC appointment, a home visit or a remote consultation. The provider had also recently introduced the direct booking of referrals which required contact with primary care services within 2 hours. This was seen as good practice, and was felt to better utilise PCC appointment capacity, and to reduce the number of times the patient had contact with the service. This approach of direct booking also reduced Operational Pressures Escalation Levels policy closures by reducing the number of patients awaiting assessment in the incoming NHS111 referral queue.

We did not look at Delivering evidence-based care and treatment during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.

We did not look at How staff, teams and services work together during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.

We did not look at Supporting people to live healthier lives during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.

We did not look at Monitoring and improving outcomes during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.

We did not look at Consent to care and treatment during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Effective.