Updated 17 December 2021
The registered provider of this services is Transform Hospital Group Limited, based at 192 Altrincham Road, Manchester, M22 4RZ. Transform Hospital Group Limited has nine clinic locations and two hospitals.
For this inspection we visited the clinic in Birmingham located at:
Transform Hospital Group Birmingham
38 Highfield Road
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 3ED
Transform Hospital Group Birmingham is registered as an independent doctors consulting service for patients over the age of 18 years. It is registered with CQC for one regulated activity: Treatment of disease, disorder or injury. Patients attend the clinic for pre- and post-operative care and assessment for a range of cosmetic and weight loss surgical procedures. For example, gastric band surgery for weight loss and breast enlargement and reduction surgery. The provider also offers other services including Botox injections for the treatment headaches and hyperhidrosis (excessive sweating).
The service is open Monday to Saturday between 9.30am and 6pm. Initial discussions and assessments are completed remotely before a face to face appointment is arranged at the clinic with a consultant surgeon. Other procedures offered at the clinic can be booked directly with the clinic.
The Birmingham clinic is led by a clinic manager, who is also the registered manager for this service. 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.
Other staffing includes three nurses who provide post-operative wound care and undertake blood sampling and swabs when needed. The clinic is also attended by a specialist nurse from the provider’s hospital to carry out gastric band adjustments following surgery. There are also two clinic co-ordinators / receptionists.
The Birmingham clinic is supported by a corporate team. The Consultant Surgeons who attend the clinic work across all the provider’s clinics and hospital sites.
How we inspected this service
Throughout the pandemic CQC has continued to regulate and respond to risk. However, taking into account the circumstances arising from 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 included:
• Conducting staff interviews with the registered manager remotely using telephone/video call
• Requesting evidence from the provider
• A shorter site visit
Due to the current pandemic we were unable to obtain comments from patients via our normal process of comment cards. However, we received comments from three patients via the CQC website. All were positive about the service they had received. We also reviewed information from online reviews and any feedback obtained directly by the provider.
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.