Archived: John Street Medical Practice

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at John Street Medical Practice on 17 March 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

Specifically, we found the practice to be good for providing safe, well-led, effective, caring and responsive services. It was also good for providing services for all the population groups

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. 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.
• Patients said they found it easy to make an appointment with a GP and that urgent appointments available the same day.
• The practice had good facilities and 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.

We saw one area of outstanding practice:

• The practice had a predominantly Bangladeshi patient population, the majority of which did not speak English as a first language. 76% of staff spoke at least two languages and there was usually a staff member available who could speak with patients in their own language. This meant staff could explain the importance of tests and treatment to patients.

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

Importantly the provider should:

• The practice should start to have formal meetings for clinical and reception/administrative staff. Minutes should be kept of these meetings.
• The provider should ensure that all GPs have up to date mandatory training, including safeguarding, basic life support and fire safety.
• Appraisals should be up to date for all staff.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice