Minutes of Patient Reference Group Meeting

Abbottswood Medical Centre

Thursday 5th January 2-3pm, Seminar Room

Present

Abbottswood Representatives

Dr G RalphsGRJulie MooreJMYvonne MerrickYM

Louise CattleLC

Patient Representatives

Mr M AmiesMAMrs E WrightEWMrs B HarrisBH

Mrs B PopeBPMr B ErasmusBEMr A KelsoAK

Mrs A FordAFMr F FranksFF

Apologies

Mrs N ClarkNCMrs J HallJHMr L EdwardsLE

Mr P GreshamPG

Dr Ralphs, Senior Partner (GR) opened the meeting with an overview of the Patient Reference Group (PRG) aims and objectives.

Julie Moore, Practice Manager (JM) clarified the ground rules for the PRG and introduced those present.

Item / Action req’d
Results of questionnaire / Questionnaires were sent to the patient representatives with their invitations to this meeting. The results of those received are as follows:
1. Range of skills and professionals available to you within the practice / 20
2. Range of skills and professionals available for you to be referred to / 28
3. Being able to register at a practice of your choice / 36
4. Seeing the same GP / 36
5. Ease of getting an emergency appointment / 23
6. Ease of booking an appointment in advance / 35
7. Being involved in decisions about the practice and its services / 58
8. Reception issues / 77
9. Car Parking issues / 74
10. Physical access to the practice / 65
11. Contacting the practice by phone / 52
12. Contacting the practice electronically / 96
The lowest score indicates the highest priority. These results will assist in the compilation of our patient survey which is to be issued shortly.
Areas of concern / The Group were asked if they had any particular areas of concern within the practice.
Elderly isolated - MA felt that perhaps the elderly isolated were a group that were overlooked.
Changes to surgery - Questions arose regarding the purchase of the old hospital site and JM confirmed that this would give AMC a six room extension with the ability to provide more services and give further car parking. Currently this is with the planners and architects.
Parking/access issues–in conjunction with the planning consents the group voiced concerns about the access to the car park, as it is an acute angle in, visibility is poor which makes access at night difficult. Should re-configuration of the car parking spaces be considered? JM confirmed that there is no permission for us to have an ‘in’ and a separate ‘out’ entrance to the car park. However the widening of the current access is being considered.
BH noted that patients often pull out of the car park onto No Gains without looking and a sign ‘LOOK LEFT’ may be a good idea in conjunction with removal of hedges. AMC have agreed to look at these areas of concern.
Electronic Contact– between patients and the surgery was discussed and VM confirmed that e-mail is not considered a safe form of communication. However GR added that in the Home Counties, 40% of patients were consulted electronically. This should therefore be an area that to ask for further comment on in the patient survey.
Appointments – Recent changes have taken place with our appointment system to try to accommodate patients requiring appointments within the next few days and this is ongoing. All ideas are welcome.
Range of skills available at both the surgery and to refer to–suggestions included access to the dietician or podiatrist within the surgery, GR confirmed that there was no funding to allow for this however, the practice website could be utilised further for information on dietary requirements and podiatrists in the area.
Referrals by choose and book allow the patient to travel wherever they wish in the country to ensure they get the next available appointment, however this is not often taken up, as patients prefer to stay local.
Attached staff (District Nurses etc) give the surgery a continuity of care across the services and this is something the surgery is keen to retain.
INR clinic – is wonderful and a great improvement on the previous service.
SW consortium – JM outlined the commissioning of services and its work to keep standards high in a pro-active way.
Wellperson checks– These checks do not exist in the same way as they used to. Patients with known chronic diseases are regularly monitored. Those patients that do not fall into these groups can be offered an NHS Health Check. Often we have found that patients we have tried to contact for such checks are those who are most reluctant to come in
Eligibility for Using Dispensary – If a patient lives within one mile as the crow-flies from the surgery they are not able to use our dispensary. This is an NHS rule that causes a lot of distress for many of our patients, but is outside of our control.
It was not wide knowledge that AMC has a Pharmacist available to give advice to patients and our survey will therefore reflect this.
Survey compilation / JM and LC will proceed with the compilation of the survey questions and will send these out to the PRG group for their consideration. Once agreed these will be made available to the patients from the 16th January to the 9th February. Results will be collated on 14th February by the Practice Project Group for discussion at the next PRG meeting.
Next meeting for PRG / Wednesday 22nd February at 2pm. Abbottswood Medical Centre, Defford Road, Pershore.