The Care Quality Commission
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Grove House Practice

Overall: Requires improvement read more about inspection ratings

St Paul's Health Centre, High Street, Runcorn, Cheshire, WA7 1AB (01928) 566561

Provided and run by:
Grove House Practice

All Inspections

15 November 2023

During a routine inspection

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Grove House Practice on 15 November 2023. Overall, the practice is rated as Requires Improvement.

The key question ratings are as follows:

Safe - Good

Effective – Requires Improvement

Caring - Good

Responsive – Requires Improvement

Well-led – Good

The full reports for previous inspections can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Grove House Practice on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

Why we carried out this inspection

We carried out this inspection in line with our inspection priorities. We inspected all of the key questions as part of this inspection.

How we carried out the inspection

This inspection was carried out in a way which enabled us to spend a minimum amount of time on site.

This included:

  • Conducting staff interviews using video conferencing.
  • Completing clinical searches on the practice’s patient records system (this was with consent from the provider and in line with all data protection and information governance requirements).
  • Reviewing patient records to identify issues and clarify actions taken by the provider.
  • Requesting evidence from the provider.
  • A site visit.

Our findings

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service on a combination of:

  • what we found when we inspected
  • information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services and
  • information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

We found that:

We rated the provider as good for providing safe services. This was because:

  • The practice had clear systems, practices and processes to keep people safe and safeguarded from abuse.
  • Staff had the information they needed to deliver safe care and treatment.

We rated the provider as requires improvement for providing effective services. This was because:

  • Patients prescribed medicines that required monitoring and those with long-term conditions were not always receiving appropriate monitoring or reviews, to ensure their treatment was optimised in line with national guidance.

We rated the provider as good for providing caring services. This was because:

  • Staff treated patients with kindness and respect.
  • Staff helped patients to be involved in decisions about their care and treatment.

We rated the provider as requires improvement for providing responsive services. This was because:

  • The results of the most recent General Practice Patient Survey highlighted a number of areas for improvement.

We rated the provider as good for providing well-led services. This was because:

  • There was compassionate and inclusive leadership at all levels.
  • There was evidence of systems and processes for learning, continuous improvement and innovation.

We found one breach of regulations. The provider must:

  • Ensure care and treatment is provided in a safe way to patients.

We also found that the provider should:

  • Take action to improve the uptake of childhood immunisations and cervical cancer screening.
  • Continue to work towards improving the areas identified in the General Practice Patient Survey.

Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence tables.

Dr Sean O’Kelly BSc MB ChB MSc DCH FRCA

Chief Inspector of Health Care

29 September 2015

During a routine inspection

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Grove House Practice on 29 September 2015. Overall the practice is rated as good.

Please note that when referring to information throughout this report, for example any reference to the Quality and Outcomes Framework data, this relates to the most recent information available to the CQC at that time.

Our key findings across all the areas we inspected were as follows:

  • Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise concerns and report incidents and near misses. The practice leads on safeguarding were able to show us examples of interventions that had resulted in enhanced safety measures being put in place for those patients who were deemed to be vulnerable. This had sometimes involved GPs challenging decisions of safeguarding boards, when further local knowledge indicated some decisions would need to be reviewed immediately to safeguard the most vulnerable patients.
  • The practice used innovative and proactive methods to improve patient outcomes. We saw that the practice used Met Office forecasts for example, for cold weather warnings, to plan for and meet increased needs of those patients with long term conditions. The practice had recently started to trial e-consulting where patients would email the practice with their symptoms and GPs would respond on the day.
  • Patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect. We saw how the practice dealt compassionately with patients and did all they could to assist in the support of carers and family members.
  • The practice staff and clinicians held regular focussed meetings to ensure that care was ‘joined up’ and that it continued to meet the changing needs of more complex patients.
  • The practice made changes to the way it delivered services as a consequence of feedback from patients and from the Patient Participation Group (PPG). For example, the practice used ‘positive action’ in recruitment to secure the services of a permanent male practice nurse to help increase engagement with male patients of all ages. The flu season clinics were being used to raise awareness of other men’s health issues, for example prostate health.
  • The practice had a clear vision which had quality and safety as its top priority. A business plan was in place, was monitored and regularly reviewed and discussed with all staff. High standards were promoted and owned by all practice staff with evidence of team working across all roles.
  • The practice had worked extensively with specialist providers outside the area to ensure they supported a very high level of care to younger patients with high dependency and complex needs. We saw how the practice supported families of these patients by being accessible at all times. This was achieved by using a buddy system amongst the GP partners, which meant the patient and their families would see one of two GPs who were familiar with the patients and families needs.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice