ELDENE SURGERY PATIENT PARTICIPATION GROUP
Minutes of Meeting held at Eldene Surgery
Thursday 11th January 2018 10:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Present
Norma ThompsonNTPPG (Appointed Chair)
Ruth AtkinsRACCG Guest Speaker
Steph BurrowsSBPPG
Kay GilbertKGEldene Surgery
Robin GrievesRGPPG
Anthony HarperAHPPG
Dr E HollidayEHEldene Surgery
Derek LinfordDLPPG
David MargettsDMPPG
Liz StrangeLS(Stand-in Chair, this meeting) PPG
Chris Trow GWH Guest Speaker
Diane WatsonDWPPG
Mandi WilkinsonMWEldene Surgery
Apologies
Catherine LyonsCLPPG
- Minutes of previous meeting held on 21st November 2017 and Matters Arising
The minutes were approved as an accurate record, proposed by AH and seconded by MW.
- Matters Arising from Minutes of 21st November 2017.
2.1Mandiintroduced Kay Gilbert who has been recently appointed as the practice Medical Secretary. She then updated the meeting on other recent staffing changes/appointments and the status quo.
- Hayley Boyd-Thorpe had left and a replacement appointed.
- Recruiting was in process for a new receptionist.
- Dr Laura Smith would be returning after maternity leave on 5th February 2018 and would do 6 sessions per week (Monday, Tuesday, and Friday afternoons), Dr Holliday and Dr Applegate both did 6 sessions per week. Dr Dastagirdoes 1 day a week and from April 2018 Dr Suhaimi (a new appointment but yet to be confirmed) would be scheduled to do 3 days a week.
- There were also plans to appoint an Advanced Nurse Practionerfor 4 days a week, who would be able to prescribe and deal with minor illnesses and to recruit a chronic disease nurse, to deal with diabetic patients etc.
- Accountable Care in Swindon
The chair welcomed Ruth Atkins and Chris Tow, who gave a presentation 0utlining how the Accountable Care model had been designed to address the problems currently facing health authorities in Swindon and across the country. Team Swindon has been set up with the aim of co-ordinating and integrating health care across the various providers over the next two years (2018-2021). Points arising in discussions:
3.1 There was a constant need for patients to repeat the medications they were taking, when attending at different parts of the health system and to differenthealth professionals. For example the IT system at GWH was unable to display medications prescribed by GPs in Swindon. At the Eldene Practice Eric said that although the new IT system, System One was updated in live time with District Nurses activities, some adjustments/amendments would be needed to enable ‘out of hours’ doctors etc. to access patients notes. He proposed that patient’s medical notes be automatically made live on the system and that they be given the option to opt out. This discussion highlighted that the important part of integration across all sectors of the health service was the need for IT systems to be compatible and unfortunately Chris said that there was not a new pot of money for this. Eric said it was one of the aspects of the integration which should ideally been given priority.
3.2 Currently there was no central ‘directory’ of information listing or recording all available health, community and voluntary services to put patients in touch with specialist advice. Team Swindon had been set up to facilitate working across the various organisations in a more co-ordinated way.
3.3 One ‘hurdle’ to overcome was the current apportioning of individual budgets to the different providers. The example of DevoManc (the devolution of health and social care to Manchester) where there was one big pot of money for all services was cited as a possible exemplar. Swindon was in an analogous position in so far as we had one unitary authority, in addition there was one acute and community provider (GWH NHS Foundation Trust).
3.4 Ruth and Chris asked the PPG members to feedback any further thoughts they had (contact details were listed at the end of the slide presentation handed out on the day) and offered to come back to a meeting of the Eldene PPG at a later date to update on progress with the project.
4. General Feedback and Discussion
4.1 Friends and Family Test
A follow up Friends and Family questionnaire was now being sent out to patients by text following an appointment at the surgery. This had led to twenty six questionnaires being received – an increased response rate on several previous months.
4.2 Missed Appointments
There was a high incidence of missed appointmentsat the Practice and to help reduce this, two approaches had been adopted –Mjog, a system which sends text message reminders a day before an appointment is due and a ‘three strike’ approach. A letter is sent out after each missed appointment, culminating in the third and final letter which gave notice of removal from the surgery list.
4.3 Patient Contact Details
As part of this greater use of texting etc., patient contact details were being checked by staff during appointments. It was suggested that during the registration for the online prescription and appointment facilities on the Eldene web site updated contact details could be collect. These would then need to be transferred to patient records at the surgery. Mandi said she would explore this with the IT trainer due to visit the surgery in the coming week. Action: MW
4.4 Pharmacy2U
Some confusion was being caused to patients at the surgery, who had received a letter from Pharmacy2U a private firm offering a repeat prescription service and delivery by post to patients. This is not related to any NHS model repeat prescriptions service or linked to individual surgeries. It was decided that the Practice would make this clear to patients, by posting a notice on the news section of the website, placing notices in the surgery, and inclusion in the Practice Newsletter.
Action: MW
4.5 Complaints, review of complaints and suggestions
No complaints or suggestions had been received. Stef asked if patients had been unsettled by recent changes to online prescription ordering or appointments which required re-registration with a new password. Mandi said there was no evidence of this but there had been some reaction to the withdrawal of the ability to book a telephone conversation with a doctor. The high demand of 30-40 pre-booked calls per day had been simply unsustainable.
4.6 PPG Forum
Liz will circulate slides from Chris Woodward’s and Patrick Ismond’s presentations from the PPG Forum:
- Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment PNA, Chris Woodward;
- CQC inspections at GP practices, Inspection arrangements for the future, Patrick Ismond.
Jo Osario’s notes would also be circulated along with the slide presentations. Jo’s notes make reference to the other presentation: HIV testing and other public health matters, by Angela Smith. No slides are available for this presentation as yet. No date has been set yet for the next Forum. Action: LS
5. Update
5.1 Computer System
The embedding in of the new computer system was going well.
5.2. Demographic data of surgery’s patients
This had now been provided to Norma, and it was anticipated that better data would be provided from the new computer system.
5.3 Nepalese Community
Norma had invited Maita Limbu to the PPG meeting to help the practice understand the problems around their lack of birth certificates, which doctors they are registered with and to get them involved in medical educational campaigns. Unfortunately he had not been available. Norma would continue to try and arrange a visit. Action: NT
Date of Future Meetings:
15th March 2018
17 May 2018 (AGM)
1