Gosport GP surgery requires improvement over safety concerns, says CQC
CONCERNS have been raised by the healthcare watchdog after they uncovered problems around high-risk medicines at a GP surgery.
Bury Road Surgery in Gosport has been rated as ‘requires improvement’ by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), which found flaws in the safety and leadership of the GP practice.
Although the CQC rated the surgery as ‘good’ in effectiveness, caring and responsiveness, it highlighted some key issues that must be addressed.
Officers carried out the inspection in January, following a previous visit in November 2018 where the practice was also rated as ‘requires improvement’.
The report said: ‘Although we found improvements since the last inspection, there were still some gaps in safety systems.
‘There was not a system for checking all staff were up to date with their routine immunisations.
‘There were gaps in the process for checking safe prescribing of high-risk medicines and the process had not been formally defined.’
In the report, the leadership of the practice was also criticised.
CQC inspectors again noted improvements since the previous inspection in 2018, but there is still progress to be made, particularly in the case of staff training.
‘The policies and procedures had not been consistently reviewed and updated,’ the report continued.
‘There had not been clear oversight of staff training and risks had not been consistently identified and managed.’
Dr Carl Anandan, the senior GP partner at Bury Road surgery, said: ‘We acknowledge that there is always room for improvement, and we are addressing our issues with robust procedures – and working in-line with the recommended guidelines and learning from other practices which achieved ‘outstanding’ CQC reports.
‘We have already put in place processes around the safe checking of high risk medicines and the monitoring of staff training that we are confident means that there would be a very different report if the CQC re-inspected us today.
‘The CQC report acknowledges that improvements have been made since its last visit – those achievements have been secured at a time when our patient numbers have risen significantly, and so great praise is due to our staff, who are delivery extraordinary care despite the growing pressures they face.’