Archived: Diet UK Bolton

Updated 6 December 2019

Diet UK Bolton offers a private weight reduction service for adults over the age of 18.

• The clinic is on the first floor of a shared building. The premises consists of a reception with a waiting area and two clinic rooms. The clinic is open for pre-booked appointments on Tuesdays from 11:00am to 2:00pm and on Wednesdays 12:00pm to 2:00pm and 4:00pm to 6:00pm.
• The clinic employs two doctors (one of whom is the registered manager) one receptionist and one senior receptionist.
• There is also a branch location (which is located in Preston town centre) open on Mondays and Wednesdays 10:30am to 1:30pm and patients can be seen at either location.

How we inspected this service

Prior to the inspection we reviewed information about the service, including the previous inspection report and information from the provider. We spoke to the registered manager, doctor and receptionist and reviewed a range of documents.

To get to the heart of patients’ experiences of care and treatment, we always ask the following five questions:

• Is it safe?
• Is it effective?
• Is it caring?
• Is it responsive to people’s needs?
• Is it well-led?

These questions therefore formed the framework for the areas we looked at during the inspection.

Updated 6 December 2019

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Diet UK Bolton to rate the service as part of our inspection programme.

Diet UK Bolton is a private clinic which provides medical treatment for weight loss for adults over the age of 18.

This service is registered with CQC under the Health and Social Care Act 2008 in respect of some, but not all, of the services it provides. There are some exemptions from regulation by CQC which relate to particular types of regulated activities and services and these are set out in and of The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014. Diet UK Bolton provides a range of non-surgical cosmetic interventions, which are not within CQC scope of registration. Therefore, we did not inspect or report on these services.

The clinic employs two doctors, one of whom is the registered manager. A registered manager is a person who is registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated regulations about how the service is run.

22 people provided feedback about the service. All the feedback was positive. Patients told us staff were professional, caring, empathetic and listened. Patients described the clinic and facilities as clean and hygienic.

Our key findings were :

• Patients felt supported by the service.
• The provider was completing audits to demonstrate weight loss over time.
• The new premises were appropriate to meet people’s needs.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

• Only supply unlicensed medicines against valid special clinical needs of an individual patient where there is no suitable licensed medicine available.
• Update policy to ensure a system to retain medical records in line with Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) guidance, in the event that the provider cease trading.
• Review the feedback they request from patients to include more information about the consultation and treatment.
• Review audit of medical records to provide assurance of appropriate record keeping.
• Establish systems to ensure policies are reviewed appropriately.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGP