AW Surgeries

Updated 22 December 2023

Albion House Surgery is a long-established practice and is the main practice for AW surgeries, registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) as a partnership provider and located in the Brierley Hill area of Dudley. There are two surgery locations that form the practice which are Albion House Surgery and Withymoor Surgery. Patients can be seen by staff at both practice sites.

The provider is registered with CQC to deliver the Regulated Activities, diagnostic and screening procedures, family planning, maternity and midwifery services and treatment of disease, disorder or injury and surgical procedures.

The practice delivers General Medical Services (GMS) to a patient population of about 16,997. This is part of a contract held with NHS England.

The practice population is predominantly white (92.8%) and asian (4.4%) patients. Information published by Public Health England shows that deprivation within the practice population group is in the fourth from the lowest decile (four out of ten). The lower the decile, the more deprived the practice population is relative to others.

The clinical staffing comprises of seven GP partners (4 female, 3 male), 2 salaried GPs, 2 advanced nurse practitioners, 4 nurses and 3 health care assistants. The non-clinical staffing comprises of a practice manager with a team of 25 administration staff.

The practice is open for appointments between 8am and 6:30pm during weekdays. On Tuesdays and Wednesdays extended hours are offered between 6:30pm and 8pm. The practice is open between 9am and midday on Saturdays. There are also arrangements to ensure patients receive urgent medical assistance when the practice is closed during the out-of-hours period.

Updated 22 December 2023

We carried out an announced assessment of AW Surgeries on Wednesday 15 November 2023.

This was a targeted review of responsive services. The practice was previously inspected in January 2019 and had previously been rated good overall and good in safe, effective, caring and well led but rated as requires improvement in responsive. Any previous ratings for the overall rating, safe, effective, caring and well-led will be unchanged following this review.

Rating at this inspection:

Responsive – Requires improvement.

How we carried out the assessment

This assessment was carried out virtually, through an online meeting and review of documents.

This was with consent from the provider and in line with all data protection and information governance requirements.

This included:

• Requesting evidence from the provider.
• A virtual meeting with the provider.

Our findings

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

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

We have rated this practice as Requires improvement for responsive services.

We found that:

• Patients could access care and treatment in a timely way.
• The practice had a new phone system and was monitoring performance data on calls.
• The practice had access via online forms.
• There was clinical triage of patient requests for appointments and ongoing treatment in place which was being monitored.

However, we also found that:

• The National GP Survey results for the period 1 January 2023 to 30 April 2023 had remained below national averages.
• The practice had taken action to address access issues but there was limited evidence on the impact these positive improvements had on patients.

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

Dr Sean O’Kelly BSc MB ChB MSc DCH FRCA

Chief Inspector of Hospitals and Interim Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services