Hackenthorpe Medical Centre
Patient Participation Report March 2014
Our Patient Group was formed in June 2012. We had been collating names of patients who may be interested for a while prior to this, so started by contacting these patients initially. We arranged our first meeting where it was agreed that we would use the large flip chart in our foyer to attract the attention of other patients visiting the Medical Centre who may be interested in attending. This recruited a few more patients. We also advertised on our website and in our Patient Information Booklets kept in Reception. These are available for patients to sit and peruse, prior to their appointments. Posters have been put up on the local Church Notice Boards, Hackenthorpe Housing Association, Lunch Club, and at Hackenthorpe Community Centre. We have approached patients visiting Mother and Baby Clinic and Baby Clinic in an attempt to engage some of our younger population with just a little success. We have welcomed a few more patients into our group this year however, unfortunately have lost a couple who are unable to attend any more but we are very grateful for the time our patients have given to our group over the year.
Profile: Our Patient Group are all British in ethnicity, consisting of both males and females, they come from a back ground of workers, retired (civil servant, public sector, MOD and NHS), long term sick, unemployed. Our patient population consists of a higher than average elderly population with very few patients of non British ethnicity.
Areas of Priority:
Following last years PPGroup survey of the premises, we received several suggestions of improvements, including sourcing of equipment and ideas helping towards infection control; The building has been refreshed inside and out with many refurbishments and improvements to ensure the Medical Centre is fit for purpose and a pleasant environment for our patients.
New items for discussion this year have included Internet appointments, E-Discharges, outside pillar and roof supporting stack, the arrival of NHS 111, Pharmacy opening times, Electronic Prescriptions, Walking for Health, our Abuse Protocol, Data Sharing, and positive feedback on clinical staff and receptionists. A Representative in readiness for our CQC inspection was secured.
Practice Survey
Our Practice Survey was carried out week commencing 10th – 14th February 2014. Following discussion with our Patient Group we agreed content and target audiences. The content was to specifically include access to Medical Centre, patients privacy, cleanliness, appointment waiting times and appointment booking methods. Patient Group members volunteered to meet and greet our patients, offering the Survey for completion, which resulted in an extremely efficient gathering of information we needed from our target population. Members of our Group also helped collate the information from the individual surveys, for which we were very grateful.
The Patient Group discussed the Survey findings at our meeting on 25.3.14 Agreement was reached on where improvements could be made. Where problems had been reported, it was noted that these involved very small numbers. In several of these, no specific reason for dissatisfaction had been recorded and therefore no response could be made.
Areas of improvement taken to Practice Meeting for approval/go ahead.
Call Queuing System
This was on the Practice Survey last year and the question clarified as it was thought unclear to patients. At that time 38% of our patients thought this would be a good idea, however 43% did not. ‘Patient Access’ showed 1.2% of patients unhappy with our system, 85% of patients happy. The queuing System once explored was quite expensive, and this should be monitored and reviewed this year. Our result this year for call queuing was 56.3% of patients thought it would help and 39% thought it would not. Comments received included: ‘no need phone answered promptly’ and ‘not had problems getting through’. The Group suggest we wait until the patients who feel it would be useful, raise to 65-70% and then consider implementation. The Partners agreed with this.
Privacy of patients when speaking to a receptionist.
More patients are unhappy that they can be overheard at the Reception desk (from 12% last year to 18% this year), however more people are aware that they can ask to speak to someone in a private room (30% last year to 37% this year). Some comments from the survey related to overhearing staff mentioning patient details during the course of their work. This led to a suggestion of considering a screen for the reception desk to address this. The Partners are happy to look into this and it will be added to the agenda for next PPG. Staff to be reminded about keeping voices down when working, and on the telephone.
Patients not being seen on time.
The group requested that patients are informed if a clinician is running late. Reception staff do let patients know when they check in for their appointment, if their appointment will run late. The Patient Survey showed that 10.5% of patients last year were seen less than 5 minutes after their appointment time, this being only 7% this year. A patient did comment on the survey that they had waited for as long as 30 minutes after their appointment time on several occasions, when the surgery does not appear busy’. A waiting time report can be run on S1 which will give definite results for each member of the team seeing patients. This can be published monthly and discussed in Practice Meeting to see where improvements can be made.
Cleanliness of Premises – 99.1% of patients thought our Medical Centre was ‘Clean’ or ‘very clean’ compared with 94% last year. There were two comments about the toilets regarding a funny smell. Despite checks from Drain experts no problem can be found with the drains to explain the intermittent problem. It was suggested that air fresheners/neutralisers could be purchased.
Opening Hours
It was felt we need to reiterate our usual opening hours for those patients who were not aware (this is listed on our entrance doors) in our
- Publicised Survey Results on our Waiting Room Notice Board and
- On our website.
These are 8.30am – 6.00 pm each weekday plus open late night surgery with GPs and Practice Nurse each Tuesday. Patients are able to contact us by phone, in person, by fax, via email, and via our website. It was suggested we add our opening hours to the Flipchart board to keep in the Patient Foyer to try to advertise our opening hours. There were comments from patients ‘do a late night surgery’ and ‘not open during the day’ which shows that this is necessary, as services are provided at these times.
Positive Findings from Patient Survey
Generally the Patient Group were happy with 85.3% of patients finding it very easy to get through to the surgery on the telephone. No members of the Group had encountered problems in the past. One comment was received ‘always engaged’. However two patients had responded with comments ‘phone usually answered promptly’ and ‘not had any problems getting through’.
The Group felt we do an excellent job and feel that we don’t need to worry about addressing the 3% of our patients who thought the service ‘Not Very Good’. The patient who had replied ‘Very Poor’ was 0.3% and had left a comment ‘I have had problems’
Of the replies we received 44% were able to speak to the GP of their choice some of the time. 45.7% of those who replied were able to speak or see the GP of their choice ‘always or almost always’. The Group felt there was no room for improvement considering the size of the patient list. (6667)
98.7% of our patients who replied thought they were treated with care and concern at their last appointment, which the Group were happy with and felt that there was no room for improvement.
99.1% of our patients thought that our Medical Centre was ‘very clean’ or ‘clean’.
95% of our patients would recommend someone who had just moved into our local area to register with us.
We were very pleased with the results from our Patient Survey and feel that it is a reflection of how hard the Medical Centre staff work and how caring they are.
The work commenced with the Patient Group will continue, aiming to meet on a regular basis to discuss and address concerns over the coming year.