England’s Chief Inspector of General Practice has placed a Devonshire GP practice into special measures following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission.
The Care Quality Commission has found the quality of care at the Hatherleigh Medical Centre in Hatherleigh, Devon, to be Inadequate. A full report of the inspection has been published.
The Hatherleigh Medical Centre provides primary medical services to approximately 2,180 patients at their practice.
Under CQC’s 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.
Inspectors rated the practice inadequate for being safe,and well-led and requiring improvement for being caring, effective,and responsive to people’s needs.
Ruth Rankine, Deputy Chief Inspector of General Practice for the South, said:
“It is important that the people who are registered with the Hatherleigh Medical Centre can rely on getting the high quality care which everyone is entitled to receive from their GP.
“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 believe that the practice will do what is required for the sake of its patients.”
The report highlights a number of areas where improvements must be made including:
- Staff told us the partners were approachable and took the time to listen to all members of staff, but that the practice was disorganised.
- Staff understood their responsibilities to raise concerns, and to report incidents and near misses. When things went wrong reviews and investigations were thorough. However, lessons learned were not communicated widely enough to support improvement.
- The majority of patients said they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect. However, not all felt cared for, supported and listened to by the GPs.
- Although there were a number of monthly patient record checks to monitor patient conditions, we saw insufficient evidence that formal audits were driving improvements in patient outcomes.
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