30 January 2019
During a routine inspection
Global Diagnostics Limited - The Global Clinic Norwich is operated by Global Diagnostics Limited. The service is located in the grounds of Colney Hall on the outskirts of Norwich. The service has four ultrasound scanning rooms, an x-ray room, three consulting rooms, a reception and waiting area. The service also provides magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) from a mobile van which remains permanently parked within the Colney Hall grounds.
The Global Clinic Norwich also provides services provided from eight satellite clinics held at five General Practitioner (GP) practices and three category B and C prisons.
The service provides diagnostic imaging to NHS and private patients aged 16 years and above.
We inspected this service using our comprehensive inspection methodology. We carried out the announced part of the inspection on 30 January 2019.
To get to the heart of patients’ experiences of care and treatment, we ask the same five questions of all services: are they safe, effective, caring, responsive to people's needs, and well-led? Where we have a legal duty to do so we rate services’ performance against each key question as outstanding, good, requires improvement or inadequate.
Throughout the inspection, we took account of what people told us and how the provider understood and complied with the Mental Capacity Act 2005.
The only service provided at this location was diagnostic imaging.
Services we rate
This was the first time we have rated this service. We rated it as Good overall.
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The Staff understood how to protect patients from avoidable harm, and the service worked well with other agencies to do so.
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The service had enough staff with the right qualifications, skills, training and experience to provide the right care and treatment.
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Information leaflets were provided in the service for patients on what the scan would entail and what was expected of them prior to their scan.
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Staff cared for patients with compassion. Staff provided emotional support to patients to minimise their distress. Staff involved patients and those close to them in decisions about their care and treatment.
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The service planned and provided services to meet the needs of local people whilst taking into account the patient’s individual needs.
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Patients could access the service in a timely manner.
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The service treated concerns and complaints seriously and sought patient feedback through a variety of methods.
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Written feedback from patients was consistently positive.
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The service had a clear mission statement in place with workable plans to turn it into action.
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Managers across the service promoted a positive culture that supported and valued staff.
However, we also found the following issues that the service provider needs to improve:
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Equipment such as a wheelchair and trolley in MRI unit were not labelled as ‘magnetic resonance (MR) conditional’ or ‘MR safe’, to indicate that these pieces of equipment were safe to use in an MR environment as per the Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) safety guidelines for magnetic resonance imaging equipment.
Amanda Stanford