England’s Chief Inspector of General Practice has told a Leeds GP practice that it must improve. The Highfield Medical Centre, Bramley has been placed in special measures following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission in August 2017.
Inspectors rated the practice Inadequate for safety, effectiveness and well led and Good for responsiveness and caring.
Overall the service has been rated as Inadequate. A full report of the inspection can be found on our website.
CQC had previously carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at this location in December 2016. The practice was rated as requires improvement overall. At this inspection CQC found that some areas from the December 2016 inspection had not been addressed.
The report highlights a number of areas of concern including:
Patients were at risk of harm because systems and processes were not in place to keep them safe. For example; inspectors saw no evidence that Medicines and Health Regulatory Agency (MHRA), or other patient safety alerts were discussed by the clinical team.
Some of the staff CQC spoke with told us there was a shortage of staff or that the workload was too high in order to carry out their role safely. There was little or no evidence of audits or quality improvement activity within the practice.
Alison Holbourn, Deputy Chief Inspector of General Practice for the North, said:
“I expect providers should use our inspection reports to help address their problems and rectify them as a matter of urgency. I am therefore disappointed to learn that following an inspection in December 2016 this service has deteriorated. I had hoped there would be an improvement."
“It was concerning to report that on the day of our inspection we found that patient referrals to other services were not always being carried out in a timely way. We saw a number of referrals, dating back to July 2017 which had not been actioned. This represents very poor practice."
“There were other areas of poor practice that reflected poorly on the management of the service. For example, clinical meetings were not always minuted due to lack of secretarial support. This meant there was a risk of important information being missed by some members of the team."
“It is important that the people who are registered with The Highfield Medical Centre can rely on getting high quality care. The service will be kept under review and if needed could be escalated to urgent enforcement action and if there is not enough improvement we will move to close the service.”
Ends
For further information, please contact David Fryer, Regional Communications Manager - North, on 07754 438750.
Journalists wishing to speak to the press office outside of office hours can find out how to contact the team here.
Please note: the press office is unable to advise members of the public on health or social care matters. For general enquiries, please call 03000 61 61 61.