Taunton Road Medical Centre

Updated 4 July 2022

Somerset Early Scans at Taunton Road Medical Centre is operated by Somerset Early Scans Ltd. The service is based on the first floor in the GP surgery of the same name. This service provides diagnostic obstetric ultrasound scanning for pregnant women from 16 years of age and scanning from six weeks of pregnancy to full term. It also provides non-invasive pre-natal tests and women’s health scans. The service is provided to self-funding women across Somerset.

We inspected this service using our comprehensive inspection methodology. We carried out a short-notice announced inspection on 7 April 2022. After the inspection, we telephoned women who had used the service to gather their views. The service opened in August 2014 and re-registered in 2016 following a change in its legal identity.

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 service provided the single speciality core service: Diagnostic and screening procedures

Updated 4 July 2022

At our previous inspection of the service on 25 July 2019 we rated it Good overall.

At this inspection, we rated it as outstanding because:

• People were protected by a strong safety system with a focus on openness, transparency, and learning when things go wrong. The service had enough highly qualified staff to care for women and keep them safe. The registered manager was a GP with previous experience managing an NHS recurrent miscarriage service. They brought this breadth of experience to leadership of the service. Staff had training in key skills, understood how to protect women from abuse, and managed safety well. The service controlled infection risk well. Staff assessed risks to women, acted on them and kept good care records. The service managed safety incidents well and learned lessons from them. Staff collected safety information and used it to improve the service.
• Staff provided excellent care and treatment. Managers made sure staff were competent. Staff worked well together for the benefit of women, advised them on how to lead healthier lives, supported them to make decisions about their care, and had access to good information. The service had been nominated for a range of awards. Recently, it had won the ‘Ultrasound Clinic of the Year Award 2022’ and were runners up in the Somerset Business Awards 2021 for ‘Service Excellence’.
• People were truly respected and valued as individuals and were partners in their care, practically and emotionally by an exceptional service. Staff treated women with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity, took account of their individual needs, and helped them understand their conditions. There were high levels of emotional support available to women and their companions. We saw extensive evidence of positive feedback from women who had used the service. This included from women who had received difficult news, and those who had experienced pregnancy loss.
• Services were tailored to meet the needs of individual people and were delivered in a way that ensured flexibility and choice. The service planned care to meet the needs of local people, took account of women’s individual needs, and made it easy for people to give feedback. Women told us they could access the service when they needed it and did not have to wait too long for their results. Women were supported by chaperones, to ensure women felt comfortable and received optimum emotional support. All staff received communication training to offer emotional support.
• The leadership, governance and culture were used to drive and improve high-quality person-centred care. The registered manager recognised the importance of and demonstrated commitment to best practice performance. Leaders ran services well using reliable information systems and supported staff to develop their skills. The service used a systematic approach to continually improve the quality of its services and safeguarding high standards of care by creating an environment in which excellence in this field would flourish. There were effective structures, processes and systems of accountability to support the delivery of the good quality and sustainable services.
• Staff understood the service’s vision and values, and how to apply them in their work. Staff felt respected, supported and valued. They were focused on the needs of women receiving care. Staff were clear about their roles and accountabilities. The service engaged well with women and the community to plan and manage services and all staff were committed to improving services continually. Leaders strived to deliver and motivated staff to succeed. Personal and professional staff development was positively encouraged and there was a deeply embedded system of leadership development and succession planning.
• At the last inspection evidence of satisfactory checks were not always obtained before staff started work. At this inspection, we found these had both been addressed.

Updated 4 July 2022

At our previous inspection of the service on 25 July 2019 we rated it Good overall.

At this inspection, we rated it as outstanding because:

• People were protected by a strong safety system with a focus on openness, transparency, and learning when things go wrong. The service had enough highly qualified staff to care for women and keep them safe. The registered manager was a GP with an extended role managing an NHS recurrent miscarriage service and the consultant was an expert in early pregnancy. They brought this breadth of experience to leadership of the service. Staff had training in key skills, understood how to protect women from abuse, and managed safety well. The service controlled infection risk well. Staff assessed risks to women, acted on them and kept good care records. The service managed safety incidents well and learned lessons from them. Staff collected safety information and used it to improve the service.
• Staff provided excellent care and treatment. Managers made sure staff were competent. Staff worked well together for the benefit of women, advised them on how to lead healthier lives, supported them to make decisions about their care, and had access to good information. The service had been nominated for a range of awards. Recently, it had won the ‘Ultrasound Clinic of the Year Award 2022’ and were runners up in the Somerset Business Awards 2021 for ‘Service Excellence’.
• People were truly respected and valued as individuals and were partners in their care, practically and emotionally by an exceptional service. Staff treated women with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity, took account of their individual needs, and helped them understand their conditions. There were high levels of emotional support available to women and their companions. We saw extensive evidence of positive feedback from women who had used the service. This included from women who had received difficult news, and those who had experienced pregnancy loss.
• Services were tailored to meet the needs of individual people and were delivered in a way that ensured flexibility and choice. The service planned care to meet the needs of local people, took account of women’s individual needs, and made it easy for people to give feedback. Women told us they could access the service when they needed it and did not have to wait too long for their results. Women were supported by chaperones, to ensure women felt comfortable and received optimum emotional support. All staff received communication training to offer emotional support.
• The leadership, governance and culture were used to drive and improve high-quality person-centred care. The registered manager recognised the importance of and demonstrated commitment to best practice performance. Leaders ran services well using reliable information systems and supported staff to develop their skills. The service used a systematic approach to continually improve the quality of its services and safeguarding high standards of care by creating an environment in which excellence in this field would flourish. There were effective structures, processes and systems of accountability to support the delivery of the good quality and sustainable services.
• Staff understood the service’s vision and values, and how to apply them in their work. Staff felt respected, supported and valued. They were focused on the needs of women receiving care. Staff were clear about their roles and accountabilities. The service engaged well with women and the community to plan and manage services and all staff were committed to improving services continually. Leaders strived to deliver and motivated staff to succeed. Personal and professional staff development was positively encouraged and there was a deeply embedded system of leadership development and succession planning.
• At the last inspection evidence of satisfactory checks were not always obtained before staff started work. At this inspection, we found these had both been addressed.

Updated 10 October 2019

• This is a diagnostic imaging service run by Somerset Early Scans Limited. The service is based in Bridgwater, Somerset.

  We rated the service as good because it was safe, caring and responsive. We rated well-led as outstanding. We do not rate effective for this type of service.