Archived: Brook Dudley

Brook Dudley is operated by Brook Young People. The service operates on a hub and spoke model which means there is a main clinic in Dudley town centre and six spoke clinics in local colleges and centres.

The service provides sexually transmitted infection (STI) testing, contraception and emergency contraception as well as counselling and support in improving young people’s health and well-being. Brook Dudley does not carry out termination of pregnancy at the service. We inspected the main clinic in Dudley and the head office in Tipton.

We inspected this service using our comprehensive inspection methodology. We carried out this short notice announced inspection on 5 September 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.

Services we rate

Our rating of this service was Good overall.

• The service had enough staff to care for children and young people (CYP) and keep them safe. Staff had training in key skills, understood how to protect CYP from abuse, and managed safety well. The service controlled infection risk well. Staff assessed risks to CYP, acted on them and kept good care records. They managed medicines well. The service managed safety incidents well and learned lessons from them.

• Staff provided good care and treatment. Managers monitored the effectiveness of the service and made sure staff were competent. Staff worked well together for the benefit of CYP, advised them on how to lead healthier lives, supported them to make decisions about their care, and had access to good information.

• Staff treated CYP with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity, took account of their individual needs, and helped them understand their conditions. They provided emotional support to CYP.

• The service planned care to meet the needs of local people, took account of CYP’s individual needs, and made it easy for people to give feedback. Young people could access the service when they needed it and did not have to wait too long for treatment.

• Leaders ran services well using reliable information systems and supported staff to develop their skills. 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 CYP receiving care. Staff were clear about their roles and accountabilities. The service engaged well with CYP and the community to plan and manage services and all staff were committed to improving services continually.

  We found the following areas that required improvement:

• Clinical incidents recorded on the incident log were not categorised regarding the level of risk.

• The service recorded waiting times but were not monitoring them to make improvements.

• The service did not develop action plans from recommendations from audits or monitor them for improvement throughout the year.

Following this inspection, we told the provider that it should make improvements, even though a regulation had not been breached, to help the service improve. Details are at the end of the report.

Heidi Smoult

Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals