The Care Quality Commission
  • Doctor
  • GP practice

New Washington Medical Group

Overall: Good read more about inspection ratings

Victoria Road Health Centre, Concord, Washington, NE37 2PU (0191) 415 5656

Provided and run by:
New Washington Medical Group

All Inspections

6 July 2023

During a monthly review of our data

We carried out a review of the data available to us about New Washington Medical Group on 6 July 2023. We have not found evidence that we need to carry out an inspection or reassess our rating at this stage.

This could change at any time if we receive new information. We will continue to monitor data about this service.

If you have concerns about New Washington Medical Group, you can give feedback on this service.

29 March and 5 April 2022

During a routine inspection

We carried out an announced inspection at New Washington Medical Group on 29 March and 5 April 2022. Overall, the practice is rated as Good.

The ratings for the key questions are:

Safe - Good

Effective - Good

Caring - Good

Responsive - Good

Well-led - Good

This is the first time we have inspected this practice under the current registered provider.

This practice is an amalgamation of three GP practices which came together in 2018.

They were previously registered as Victoria Medical Practice, Dr Annie Thomas, and Dr Bhatt and Dr Benn practices.

The full reports for previous inspections can be found by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for the surgery name on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

Why we carried out this inspection

This inspection was a comprehensive inspection to check how the practice was meeting essential standards and to inspect and rate it following the new registration with the Care Quality Commission.

  • As this was an inspection of a new registration, we inspected all five key questions. These are: is the practice safe, effective, caring, responsive, and well led?

How we carried out the inspection

Throughout the pandemic CQC has continued to regulate and respond to risk. However, taking into account the circumstances arising as a result of the pandemic, and in order to reduce risk, we have conducted our inspections differently.

This inspection was carried out in a way which enabled us to spend a minimum amount of time on site. This was with consent from the provider and in line with all data protection and information governance requirements.

This included:

  • Conducting staff interviews using phone calls and video conferencing
  • Completing clinical searches on the practice’s patient records system and discussing findings with the provider
  • Reviewing patient records to identify issues and clarify actions taken by the provider
  • Requesting evidence from the provider
  • A short site visit

Our findings

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service on a combination of:

  • what we found when we inspected
  • information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services and
  • information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

We have rated this practice good overall.

We found that:

  • The practice provided care in a way that kept patients safe and protected them from avoidable harm.
  • Patients received effective care and treatment that met their needs.
  • Staff dealt with patients with kindness and respect and involved them in decisions about their care.
  • The practice adjusted how it delivered services to meet the needs of patients during the COVID-19 pandemic. Patients could access care and treatment in a timely way. Although the practice recognised the challenge for patients getting through by phone, they continued to seek ways to improve and support good access for patients.
  • The way the practice was led and managed promoted the delivery of high-quality, person-centre care. Although the practice had found the pandemic challenging, they had demonstrated resilience and continuity of providing good quality of care for patients during this time.

Whilst we found no breaches of regulations, the provider should:

  • Continue to develop the staff appraisal system.
  • Continue to actively recruit new staff to the practice to fill vacancies.

Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence tables.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGP

Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care.

7 June 2016

During a routine inspection

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out a previous announced comprehensive inspection of Victoria Medical Practice on 22 September 2015 when breaches of legal requirements were found. Overall we rated the practice as inadequate and the practice was placed into special measures. After the inspection, the practice wrote to us to say what action they intended to take to address the identified breaches of regulation.

We undertook this comprehensive inspection on 7 June 2016 to check that the practice had taken this action and to confirm that they now met legal requirements. You can read the

report from our last comprehensive inspection by selecting the ‘all reports’ link for Victoria Medical Practice on our website at www.cqc.org.uk

Overall, the practice is now rated as good.

Our key findings across all the areas we inspected were as follows:

  • The practice had enlisted support from NHS England and a practice manager from another practice to make improvements following the previous inspection in September 2015. We found that the practice had made good progress and had either addressed or were in the process of addressing all of the issues previously identified. They had developed a clear vision, strategy and plan to deliver high quality care and promote good outcomes for patients.
  • Staff understood and fulfilled their responsibilities to raise concerns, and to report incidents and near misses. All opportunities for learning from internal and external incidents were maximised.
  • Risks to patients were assessed and well managed.
  • The practice carried out clinical audit activity and were able to demonstrate improvements to patient care as a result of this.
  • Feedback from patients about their care was consistently positive. Patients reported that they were treated with compassion, dignity and respect.
  • Urgent appointments were usually available on the day they were requested. Pre- bookable appointments were available within acceptable timescales.
  • The practice had a number of policies and procedures to govern activity, which were reviewed and updated regularly.
  • The practice had proactively sought feedback from patients and had implemented a patient participation group. The practice implemented suggestions for improvement and made changes to the way they delivered services in response to feedback.
  • The practice used the Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) as one method of monitoring effectiveness and had achieved good results.
  • Information about services and how to complain was available and easy to understand.
  • The practice had a clear vision in which quality and safety was prioritised. The strategy to deliver this vision was regularly discussed and reviewed with staff and stakeholders.

I am taking this service out of special measures. This recognises the significant improvements made to the quality of care provided by this service.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

22 September 2015

During a routine inspection

Letter from the Chief Inspector of General Practice

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Victoria Medical Practice on 22 September 2015. Overall the practice is rated as inadequate.

We had previously carried out an inspection of the practice on 2 September 2014 when a breach of legal requirements was found;

  • Regulation 23 HSCA 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2010 Supporting workers (which corresponds to Regulation 18 (2) of the HSCA 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014).

After the inspection on 2 September 2014 the practice wrote to us to say what they would do to meet the following legal requirements set out in the Health and Social Care Act (HSCA) 2008.

We undertook this comprehensive inspection to check that they had followed their plan and to confirm that they now met legal requirements.

Our key findings across all the areas we inspected were as follows:

  • The practice did not have systems or processes which were established or operated effectively in order to keep patients safe. For example, the systems in place for the management of medicines were not safe. There were no formal care plans or register in place to manage risk associated with the care of high risk patients.
  • Policies and procedures were not comprehensive or robust, for example, the practice recruitment policy did not contain information for which members of staff required a disclosure and barring check (DBS).
  • The practice was insular regarding decision making. There was a lack of decision making and a need for support from an external body for further development of the practice leadership.
  • Staff had not been subject to a disclosure and barring check (DBS).
  • There were concerns in relation to the way significant events were handled once they were raised.
  • We were not assured that there were effective processes and systems in place for the dissemination of safety alerts to staff who worked within the practice.
  • The practice could not demonstrate how they were managing, monitoring and improving outcomes for patients through the use of effective clinical audit. There was no scheduled audit log of clinical audit and the audits we saw were not comprehensive.
  • The practice had failed to address a requirement made at the previous inspection regarding the lack of staff appraisal.
  • The confidentiality of patients was compromised at the reception desk. Personal information discussed by receptionists could be overheard.
  • There was no specific complaints policy. The patient information leaflet on complaints did not contain information regarding taking a complaint further than the practice, for example, to NHS England or the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman.
  • CQC registration issues in the practice had not been addressed for over a year by the management team.
  • Staff had received the appropriate training with the exception of information governance and some staff had not received health and safety training.
  • Patients said they felt involved in decisions made about their care and treatment. Results from the GP National GP showed 100% of patients said they had confidence and trust in the last GP they saw compared to the local CCG average of 96% and national average of 95%.
  • Patients we spoke with said they did not have difficulty obtaining an appointment to see a GP for either routine or emergency appointments. Results from the GP National GP showed 88% patients described their experience of making an appointment as good compared to the local CCG average of 76% and national average of 73%.

There were areas of practice where the provider needs to make improvements.

The areas where the provider must make improvements are:

  • Ensure privacy of patient information.
  • Take action to ensure care and treatment is provided in a safe way for patients through the proper and safe management of medicines and the management of risk associated with the care of high risk patients.
  • Put in place systems or processes which must be established and operated effectively in order to demonstrate good governance.
  • Ensure registration issues with Care Quality Commission are addressed.
  • Ensure that recruitment information is available for each person employed. This includes completing Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks for those staff who need them.
  • Ensure that staff receive appropriate appraisal to enable them to carry out the duties they are employed to do.

In addition the provider should:

  • Carry out an infection control risk assessment.
  • Consider the introduction of on-line services.

I am placing this service in special measures. Services placed in special measures will be inspected again within six months. If insufficient improvements have been made such that there remains a rating of inadequate for any population group, key question or overall, we will take action in line with our enforcement procedures to begin the process of preventing the provider from operating the service. This will lead to cancelling their registration or to varying the terms of their registration within six months if they do not improve. 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 by adopting our proposal to vary the provider’s registration to remove this location or cancel the provider’s registration. Special measures will give people who use the service the reassurance that the care they get should improve.

Professor Steve Field (CBE FRCP FFPH FRCGP) 

Chief Inspector of General Practice

2 September 2014

During a routine inspection

The Victoria Medical Practice is situated in Washington and provides primary medical care services to patients living in and around the Washington area. 

The practice is registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to provide the following regulated activities: diagnostic and screening procedures, treatment of disease, disorder and injury and family planning.

The patients we spoke with and those who completed the CQC comment cards were extremely complimentary about the care and treatment being provided and they felt safe.  Clinical decisions are considered in line with best practice guidance.

There are effective systems in place to ensure the service is delivered to all patients in a way that meets their needs. There is collaborative working between the practice and other health and social care agencies which help to ensure patients receive the best outcomes from their treatment.  There are appropriate governance and risk management measures in place.

Systems are in place for medicines management.

The staff were caring and ensured all treatments being provided followed best practice guidance.

The leadership team are reported to be approachable and visible.

The provider was in breach of regulations related to:

Cleanliness and Infection control.

Supporting staff.

We currently review six population groups at all inspections, the detail of which can be found after the summary in this report. The needs of these population groups are identified by the practice and systems are in place to improve their access to care.

Please note that when referring to information throughout this report, for example any reference to the Quality and Outcomes Framework data, this relates to the most recent information available to the CQC at that time.