Carlton House Surgery
Patient Liaison Group
Review of Patient Survey Results
Patient Group
The practice has a long established patient liaison group, CHAMPs, (Carlton House Association of Motivated Patients), which meets on a monthly basis. In addition to patients, the meetings are attended by two staff representatives, one GP and the practice manager.
Improving the patient experience has been a regular agenda item for the last three years. This provides a discussion forum on the services provided by the practice and how these may be improved or added to. Feedback on the patients’ own experiences are welcomed as part of the discussion.
Following the introduction of a nationwide government initiative in 2011 for practices to form Patient Participation Groups, it was decided to build on the existing patient group foundation. This allows us to strengthen patient involvement in supporting and developing the services and facilities offered by the practice.
To generate interest in, and membership of the patient group, a large display was put in the waiting room, both on the practice information notice boards and the dedicated patient participation one. Freestanding notice holders containing information on how to join the group were placed around the waiting room.
In addition to this, invitation letters were put on the reception desk and staff drew patient’s attention to these, inviting them to take one and complete it if they were interested in becoming part of the group. If patients felt unable to attend meetings, they could be contacted by email to obtain their views.
In all 20 people responded. However, the practice continues to promote membership and is particularly keen to obtain input from younger patients, ethnic minorities and the disabled. A further, more colourful display is planned for late spring 2012.
Meetings are held on the third Friday of each month at 6.30pm in the practice’s meetings room. Copies of minutes are displayed in the waiting room on the Patient Participation notice board.
Patient Survey
As part of the practice’s initiative to gauge patients’ opinions on their experiences in the practice, we undertook a patient satisfaction survey using the tried and tested General Practice Assessment Questionnaire (GPAQ) and commissioned an independent research company, Patient Dynamics, to undertake the evaluation audit.
250 questionnaires were randomly distributed to patients over a 5 week period. 225 (90%) were returned.
The questions covered the following areas:
Telephone – access by telephone, ability to speak with a doctor or nurse by phone
Appointments – booking ahead, emergency appointments, access to doctors and nurses, waiting time, length of appointment
Opening times – current and preferred
Satisfaction with overall care received
Overall satisfaction with the practice
The patient group met in March 2012 to discuss the survey results and the issued raised by patients.
Overall it was felt that the results of the survey were very positive. Where national benchmarks were available, all of the practice’s responses exceeded these.
Reception
Nearly 70% of respondents found the reception staff very helpful with a further 30% stating that they were fairly helpful. Only 1% said that staff were not very helpful. Whilst the reception staff were very pleased with the result, they have asked if consideration could be given to running a further mini patient survey aimed at getting more information as to how we can continue to improve our service in this area.
Telephone
71.5% of respondents said that they found it very, or fairly easy to get through on the phone. However, 22% do not find it easy.
67% find it very, or fairly easy to speak with a doctor or nurse on the phone, whilst 11% do not find it easy.
The practice is currently reviewing potential new telephony providers and will be moving to an 0208 number in the next few months. We are currently conducting a further mini survey to find out patient’s preferences for some of the options the new systems could offer.
The patient group felt that as the doctors all offer telephone consultations as part of their service, more patient education about these is required.
Appointments
66% of patients said that if they needed to see a doctor urgently they could normally be seen on the same day. The patient group felt that there were still a number of patients who were not aware of the same day triage service that the practice has been running for almost 2 years and that more patient education was required.
90% of patients indicated the importance of being able to book appointments ahead of time, but only 27% said they found this very easy and a further 42% found it fairly easy. 24% did not find it easy.
The patient group was surprised at these percentages as the practice currently offers pre-bookable appointments up to 8 weeks ahead for the doctors and 12 weeks for the nurses. The matter was discussed at some length and it was felt that a further display of appointment information in the waiting room would be useful and that more patient education was required.
With regard to length of time it takes to see a particular doctor, 27% of respondents said that they saw the doctor on the same or next day, 22% indicated that their wait was 2-4 days and 33% said 5 days or more. Overall, 55% deemed the service good to excellent, whilst 35% deemed it fair to poor
Regarding the length of time patients may have to wait for their consultation to start, 56% of respondents found this to be excellent, very good or good, whilst 39 % deemed it fair or poor.
This was discussed at length by the patient group and it was felt that patients should be encouraged to adopt the one appointment/one person and one appointment/one problem policy to help consultations run to time. Therefore more patient education was required.
Opening
84% of patients indicated that the practice was open at times convenient to them but 12% said that it was not.
Only 24% (54 people) of total respondents answered the question on the additional times that they would like the practice to open. Of these 39% would like Saturdays, 33% after 6.30pm, 13% before 8am and 4% at lunchtime. A further 11% would like Sunday opening.
Again, some of the responses puzzled the patient group as the practice does not close at lunchtime and is usually open until 7.30pm four evenings a week with some bookable appointments available until 6.45pm. It is also open to 7.00pm on a Friday. It was felt that more patient education on the appointment system and opening times is required/
The practice used to open on Saturday morning for pre-booked appointments, however there was a very high level of patients who failed to attend these appointments, and so the service was stopped in favour of providing more late evening appointments.
Treatment
All of the questions relating to the clinical and general care given by doctors and nurses had scored high percentages in the very good/good areas. The patient group felt that these percentages reflected their own experiences at the practice.
Overall Experience
97% of respondents said that overall their experience of the surgery was good/very good or excellent. 97% would definitely or probably recommend
the practice to someone who had just moved to the area.
Survey Summary
The patient group felt that it is clear there is some patient education to be undertaken particularly in the area of appointments. The practice plans to produce a separate leaflet focussing solely on the different types of appointments offered, and how to best access these. In addition a larger information display will be put in the waiting room.
A summary of the survey will be published as a newsletter and this will also be used as a means of detailing the Triage clinics, which improve on-the-day care of patients. Hopefully patients will find this feedback useful.
Regarding the telephone, the practice is soon changing to an 0208 number and the results of the mini survey will be discussed with all of the potential providers.
We will continue to strengthen the patient group with more members and will re-advertise for these via notices and waiting room posters. The doctors and nurses will also have forms in their rooms
Finally
We would like to thank all of the patients who took time to complete a questionnaire, and our patient group representatives for their input.
We strive to move forward and improve our services and welcome your feedback at any time.