/ Prices Mill Surgery Patient Participation Group

Part of
Nailsworth Health Partnership

Minutes for PPG meeting Wednesday July 20th 2016 11.00 to 12.30

  1. Present: Marilyn Miles, Liz Green, Jo May, Suzie Colley, Hazel Millar, Sally Millett, Richard Easthope
  1. Apologies for absence: Paul and Betty Young., Kate Kay, Roz Mulhall, John Miles

3 Minutes oflast meeting 18th February 2016

These were accepted as a correct record.

4 Matters arising not covered by the agenda:

  1. A new sign for Prices Mill Surgery has been placed at the pedestrian entrance to highlight the way in.
  2. A request was made for the edge of the pavement near the pedestrian entrance to be painted in white or yellow to highlight it for pedestrians, lighting in the area is poor and it represents a trip hazard.
  3. CQC inspection. Good in all areas. Full report is on the Prices Mill web site and a link from the PPG bit of the NHP website. Two minor concerns raised by CQC as in need of attention. One of the doctors needed to do an update course on life saving skills. This has been done. Signatures of patients on forms needed every time when minor surgery was carried out. This has been put in place.
  4. Health Fair – review of event has brought suggestions to reduce the number of venues.
  5. Volunteer Car service for hospital, doctors, and shopping. A new service in place. It can be booked for collection from front door? Information in TIC. Liz Green is going to find out all details about it. Hoping to have all the information in time for the next Prices Mill newsletter.
  6. Artlift - a group activity offered to patients who had mental health problems including depression or coping with long term illness. This had been a success with very positive feedback from participants. There is to be another initiative with different funding, to be offered to people with a cancer diagnosis. Both groups to start in September.

5 Role of Assistant Business manager –Trish Creedon is unable to attend as she does not work on Wednesdays. Suzi Colley gave a description of Trish’s role. She is a Personal Assistant to Suzi and the doctors. This role was developed by Alison the previous Business Manager. Tricia works 15 hours a week and is primarily there to undertake the administrative tasks necessary to run the surgery business. There is substantial administration involved in claiming payment from NHS England, CCG and GCC. Trish deals with invoicing, invoices and remittance advices coming into the surgery, mandatory training records for all staff and recruitment admin. She sets up the Agendas and does the minutes for Business and Clinical Meetings. She is also responsible for arranging the Protected Learning Time sessions on bi-monthly basis

6 2016 Surgery Questionnaire. Follow up to our suggestions for additional questions made at the last meeting (February 18th). Our suggestions will be incorporated in the next questionnaire which is planned for September. The surgery is still deciding whether to use an outside body to conduct the survey or do it in-house. The questions we proposed were:_

  1. Is the information on the waiting room screen useful to you?
  2. The screen is used when the patients name is called. Would Dr/nurses information be useful? e.g. name of Dr, as well as room number. When a Dr, Nurse is running late?
  3. Is there a case for background music?
  4. Do you know about the surgery newsletter?

7 Suggestions for talks. We need to agree which speakers to follow up and set some dates. From last meeting - feedback in the ways to generate topics for talks

  1. Circulate the NHP membership. (Sally Millett to ask Sam Pereira). This was done.
  2. Question put on NHP website Marilyn Miles did this and there was no response
  3. Ideas from patients and staff in surgery (Jo May to circulate staff and prompt from screen in waiting room – Suzi Colley). This was done but again no further suggestions
  4. Item in Nailsworth News (Marilyn Miles to do). She has had one response from a man who would like to give a talk on diet. He had sent a paper he had written which Marilyn has shown to a friend who is a dietician. This person had said that the references quoted in the paper were rather out of date and many of the ideas presented have since been disproved. She felt this would not be a suitable speaker for a GP practice promoted talk. There may be other ideas for a wider ranging session on diet in general The response from the medical staff in the surgery is that GP’s don’t endorse any particular diet unless clinically proven, They encourage healthy diet in general. We could promote this theme at the next Health Fair.
  5. Claire Janik, MD of Corinium Care in Nailsworth has been in touch following the NHP AGM in February and she is willing to give a talk on dementia. She wrote “I have experienced how good dementia care can help improve individual situations and enabled families to enjoy life together again. So much is about good communication and using the right techniques to reach people - that is what I would like to talk about. Ideally, I would like Nailsworth to become a dementia friendly town. I also have my own personal experience as my mother had Parkinson's Disease with associated dementia”
    In addition the new Town Clerk Katherine Kearns have been in touch with Hazel Millar, Chair of NHP, about replicating a public talk that Painswick local council have recently held on this topic. There are a couple of GPs in the practice who have a special interest in dementia. We agreed to the chair’s suggestion that she sets up a joint meeting with all interested parties to explore the feasibility of Nailsworth becoming a dementia friendly town. The District Council is already working to be “dementia friendly”. We may at a future date hold an open meeting in the Surgery room, Prices Mill.

8 Promotion of the PPG

  1. Marilyn Miles attended a Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) event on 8th April. There were several presentation including one on the new shared information policy and one about promoting your PPG from Romney House surgery in Tetbury. The chair has a blog which you might be interested in reading (see her item on the CCG event on joining up your information – JUYI – posted on 8/4/16) We did not feel this was a route we wished to follow.,
  2. Any other suggestions If there are flu clinics this year perhaps members of the PPG could attend and do some promotion of what the PPG is all about – hopefully achieving some new members,
  3. Suzi has contact with a charity which does free assessments of possible aids to track vulnerable people ref. falls or failure to take medicine.

9 Nailsworth Children’s centre. Marilyn Miles as chair of the PPG and Hazel Millar as chair of NHP wrote letters supporting the retention of a dedicated children’s centre at The Arkell centre. There have been reports in the Nailsworth News that Cllr Dorcas Binns was intending to find some money to retain the centre but it was not clear if this was continued funding. A copy of the letter from MM has been circulated PPG and doctors are very supportive of keeping the children’s centre in the current format which is reaching vulnerable mums and children. Cllr Sally Millett and Cllr Steve Robinson are to prepare a report for presentation to Town Council based on the information from GCC. Suzi will forward a report to the 2 councillors she has prepared for the GPs which looks at the implications of losing the centre. There is also going to be an investigation into possible grant funding. One of our members suggested approaching Dale Vince to ask if he would set up a trust fund. This will be taken to council to pursue.

10 Feedback from PPG cluster

  1. At a meeting at the end of last year all PPGs were asked to consider having a confidentiality policy. An agreed draft was circulated to all PPGs. Nailsworth Health Partnership (of which the PPG is a part) already has a confidentiality policy (see appendix 2 of agendaa) which is probably not appropriate as it refers primarily to the NHP management committee. Appendix 1 is the suggested confidentiality policy for PPGs. Prices Mill PPG agreed to endorse this policy and it will be posted on the NHP and Prices Mill surgery websites
  2. At the CCG meeting on 8/4/16 there were several groups being set up by the CCG to look at specific areas. Marilyn Miles has signed up for the one on medications
  3. Feedback from CCG event for PPGs on 8/7/16. There was a talk about flu vaccinations. Prices Mill will decide at their next Clinical Meeting which format they will be following
  4. Library - here to help leaflets and books on prescription. The one on dementia was shown to PPG members and the one for young people has been passed to the youth club

11 Future events which may be of interest to PPG members. CCG events for PPGs. Often 2 PPG members from a surgery attend these

Meeting Day and Time / Venue unless otherwise stated is / Suggested agenda items
Friday 7 October 2016,
10-12 noon / Churchdown Community Centre
After that it will be January 2017 / Churchdown Community Centre

12 Any other business

  1. The reception area and waiting room has been tidied up and now the Friends and Families cards are in the reception area
  2. Jo May asked the PPG what they thought about having the concrete wall outside the entrance decorated. It currently has 4 screws for displaying the banner for the NHP walking festival. Marilyn Miles agreed to talk to Sue Reed about the students at Ruskin Mill helping (they did the mural in the bus station area)

13 Dates of next meeting

  1. Thursday December 1st at Prices Mill Surgery
  2. Following meetings will be in March and July 2017 as we agreed to hold 3 meetings a year. Dates and times to be confirmed at the next meeting.

Sally Millett
Secretary Prices Mill PPG.

Appendix 1

PPG CODE OF PRACTICE, November 2015
PPG's have been set up in many practices across the Stroud and Berkeley Vale areas, to act as a patient voice aimed at improving the patient experience. The PPG can assist patients in understanding the changes that are being implemented in the NHS. Groups across the district meet regularly to share experiences and their views can be represented on the Stroud and Berkeley Vale Local Executive Group through the Patient Representative who chairs the PPG Group meetings.

PPG Group meetings are held quarterly chaired by the Patient Representative and a GP from The S&BV LEG attends to answer queries. The GP who attends these meetings also has representation on the Gloucester Commissioning Group. Communication between meetings of the group meeting is by email.

The S&BV LEG meets monthly and the patient representative has the opportunity of taking forward questions or ideas from the PPG group meetings.

This series of meetings provides an important link between patients and the decision makers involved in Commissioning for Gloucestershire patient services.

COMMUNICATION

Patient questions

The PPG group are not responsible for handling Patient Complaints but may be approached by a patient. If a member of the group is approached, they should give the patient the following advice

GP Issues If this is specific with their GP or an appointment with their GP, communication should always be with that GP.

Practice Issues This should generally be with the Practice Manager but if unresolved can be with the GP that attends your PPG meetings.

Patient and Advice & Liaison group (PALS)

If the Patient is not happy with the above procedure, they can be referred to PALS

General issues These can be referred to the S&BV LEG patient representative for discussion at their meetings.

Confidentiality

The PPG may be approached by or hear third party issues affecting patients.

Discussing Patient Issues at Meetings, the patient should always be referred to anonymously, e.g. the patient. You may wish to qualify this by 'elderly lady, this young boy', etc.

Discussing Patient Issues with their GP or Practice Manager If requested to by a patient, it may be necessary to use a patients name, make this clear to the patient and check that you have their permission, making it clear who you will be discussing this with.

Discussing Issues outside the surgery at PPG Group meetings or S&BV LEG this should be anonymous e.g. this elderly lady, this young boy, etc. If the S&BV LEG require a name because they wish to take the matter further, check with the patient and your PPG if this is OK with them and explain the reason you need to identify them or their doctor.