A Bromley GP practice has been rated Inadequate overall by the Care Quality Commission.
Charterhouse Surgery in Sevenoaks Road, Orpington, was rated Inadequate for being safe, effective, responsive and well-led. It was rated Requires Improvement for being caring following the inspection in November 2016.
During the inspection at Charterhouse Surgery, which looks after some 8000 people in south east London, CQC inspectors found a number of areas where the practice must improve, including:
- Ensure face to face basic life support training is provided for all staff.
- Ensure records are maintained when checking the working status of a defibrillator.
- Ensure that a fire, legionella, asbestos and health and safety risk assessment of the premises is undertaken.
- Ensure the system in place for the monitoring of emergency medicines and vaccines stored in the refrigerators is safe and there is a system for monitoring of refrigerator temperatures.
- Consider how patients would call for help from the patient toilet.
- Ensure that regular appraisals are undertaken for all staff.
Professor Ursula Gallagher, CQC's Deputy Chief Inspector of General Practice, said:
"We are placing Charterhouse Surgery into special measures. Services placed in special measures will be inspected again within six months."
“The service will be kept under review and if needed could be escalated to urgent enforcement action. Where necessary, another inspection will be conducted within a further six months, and if there is not enough improvement we will move to close the service. Special measures will give people who use the service the reassurance that the care they get should improve."
“On a positive note we spoke with a number of patients during the inspection. Most patients said they were happy with the care they received and thought staff were approachable, committed and caring.”
Patients registered with the practices being placed into special measures should be aware that a package of support is offered by NHS England and the Royal College of GPs to ensure that there are no immediate risks to patient safety at these GP practices whilst improvements are being made.
A full report of this inspection has been published on our website.
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