OHP-Church Road Surgery

On this page

• Overview
• Person-centred Care
• Care provision, Integration and continuity
• Providing Information
• Listening to and involving people
• Equity in access
• Equity in experiences and outcomes
• Planning for the future

We carried out an announced assessment of one quality statement, equity of access, on 11 March 2024. The leaders used people’s feedback and other evidence to actively seek to improve access for people. Services were designed to make them accessible and timely for people who were most likely to have difficulty accessing care. However, the impact on patient feedback had yet to be fully realised. The provider prioritised, allocated resources and opportunities as needed to tackle inequalities and achieve equity of access.

This service scored 54 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

We did not look at Person-centred Care during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Responsive.

We did not look at Care provision, Integration and continuity during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Responsive.

We did not look at Providing Information during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Responsive.

We did not look at Listening to and involving people during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Responsive.

Patients could book appointments by telephone, online, and in person by visiting the practice. Follow up appointments were booked directly by the surgery to ensure patients received an appointment when needed. Appointments were available face to face, by telephone, online or as a home visit. The majority of appointments in the last year were face to face (65%) although face to face appointments attracted the highest DNA rates at 7%. Text messaging appointment reminders were used to try and minimise DNA rates. Data for February 2024 showed approximately half of the appointments were same day appointments. Patients were able to book routine appointments up to 6 weeks in advance. The practice offered appointments during their core opening hours 8am to 6.30pm on weekdays. Pre-booked appointments were available on weekday evenings and at the weekend as part of the extended access arrangements which were also hosted by the practice. In addition, the practice offered appointments from 7.30am in recognition of the needs of their patient population, in which there was a large cohort of shift workers who worked nights for a local industry. The practice had arrangements in place for prioritising patients. Staff were trained in care navigation to book appointments with members of the practice clinical team or signpost patients to other appropriate services and were supported to do this by documented protocols and access to a duty doctor. The duty doctor system was able to accommodate urgent appointments that came in on the day. In order to meet urgent needs when same day appointments were fully booked, the urgent requests were triaged by a GP to identify the most suitable service for their needs and The practice offered appointments from a variety of clinical staff in addition to GPs and practice nurses for example, pharmacists, physician associates, advanced nurse practitioners, mental health practitioners and care co-ordinators.

We reviewed the practice's GP National Patient Survey results for 2023. Results for four questions relating to access showed the practice scores were below national averages. In particular, the question as to how easy it was to get through to someone at their GP practice on the phone scored 33% compared to the national average of 49.6%. Trends in the GP National Patient Survey showed the practice had scored lower than the national average in general over the last five years, although was showing slight improvement in 2023. An in-house survey undertaken by the practice in January 2024 received approximately 450 responses. This showed higher results than the GP National Patient Survey. For example, 57% of patients rated the service good for getting through on the telephone and 75% rated the service good for overall experience of making an appointment. There were 2 reviews left on the NHS Website within the last 12 months, both negative and one related to difficulties obtaining an appointment. The practice participated in the Friends and Family Test (FFT) which invites patients to say whether they would recommend the service to others. The latest FFT results for February 2024 showed 87% of patients said they would recommend the service to others. There were five comments that mentioned access, 4 were negative and 1 was positive. The practice had received 2 complaints in the last 12 months, neither of which mentioned access. We received feedback from 3 patients in the last 12 months none of which related to access. Although we saw no formal action plans recorded, it was clear from minutes of meetings within the practice and through their PCN that improving access was high on the agenda. Leaders told us about some of the changes they had made to improve access such as the recruitment of additional clinical staff, advising patients how they can request appointments online and creating a greater range of appointments that reflected patient needs.

The leaders demonstrated they were aware of the challenges to patient access and acted to improve patient access. They told us how in the previous 12 months they had offered approximately 76,000 appointments, over half of which were face to face appointments (approximately one third were with a GP). Over 4 years the practice demonstrated a 29% increase in the number of appointments provided. Leaders explained how they used data available from their telephone system to identify busy periods and allocate staffing accordingly. They told us how they had changed their clinical system in the last 12 months to support better reporting on access utilisation and felt there was capacity in the system to meet patient need. Leaders shared with us data from their telephone system for three months between December 2023 and February 2024. During that period the practice had received approximately 37,000 calls of which 52% were answered. Of the calls that joined the queueing system the percentage of answered calls rose to approximately 86%. Average waits for calls in the queue being answered were approximately 6 minutes while those that were missed were around 5 minutes. The leaders promoted the use of their online services to improve access. They had ran workshops to support patients to use online systems and increased online access accounts from 14% in July 2023 to 23% in January 2024. The practice provided opportunities and support for different groups of patient population to overcome health inequalities. For example, they were flexible in offering appointments to support their population needs, alerts on the clinical system enabled staff to identify and make reasonable adjustments for patients who struggled to attend. The practice had also recently signed up as a safe surgery helping to remove barriers to people who may not have proof of identity or an address and had received accreditation as a veteran friendly service and for excellence in LGBTQ+ in healthcare.

We did not look at Equity in experiences and outcomes during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Responsive.

We did not look at Planning for the future during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Responsive.