9 May 2014
During an inspection looking at part of the service
Regulation 13 requires that people using the service are protected from the risks associated with unsafe use and management of medicines. We found that some vaccines were stored in an unsecured fridge and that others had passed their use by date. There was no up-to-date record of regular checks being made to ensure that expired medications were disposed of and not used in error.
Regulation 19 requires that providers must have in place an effective system for identifying, receiving, handling and responding to complaints and comments made by people who use services. We saw that only minimal information was given to people on how to submit a complaint about the service. The provider had no system for people using the service to submit comments. The provider did not monitor or respond to comments left by people using the service on the NHS Choices website.
Regulation 21 requires that providers operate effective recruitment procedures and maintain certain records relating to staff. There was limited evidence to show that the provider carried out appropriate pre-employment checks and ongoing checks to confirm that staff working at the practice were, and remained, suitable to do so.
Following our inspection in January 2014, the provider sent us a plan of the actions intended to meet the requirements of the regulations. At this inspection, we checked that the actions had been implemented. We spoke with the practice manager and administrative staff and inspected documents and records relating to the management of medicines, complaints handling and recruitment procedures and records keeping. We inspected the storage facilities for medications. We saw that the provider had introduced new procedures to address the concerns we had identified. We found that the actions taken by the provider were appropriate and sufficient to comply with the regulations.