South Lewisham Group Practice Patient Participation Group
Committee meeting 2pm Thursday 27th June 2014 at South Lewisham Group Practice
In Attendance: DL, RJ, ER, DF, DC, GG, AC Chair, CB Secretary, LP Work Experience Student.
NB: Actions items highlighted and listed at end of minutes
Apologies forAbsence: EW, PM, DS, AP (general member)
1. Welcome and introductions:
DL asked the committee if work experience student could join us as part of her experience and all agreed. AC welcomed her and informed her that she could join in discussions if she felt the need.
Apologies:EW, PM, DS. AC.
AC informed the committee that, as agreed at previous meeting, one of the members AP had asked to come along but, as not yet arrived, we would start without him and he could join us on arrival.
AC asked if all had read the last meeting minutes and we could consider them read or if any comments or changes needed. All agreed OK minutes then considered as read.
2. Secretarial Role:
AC explained that our Secretary DS.Unfortunately has problems providing an exact date for her return to her role following her maternity leave, and asked the committee views and opinions as to the way forward, as a Secretary was needed due to the increasing work load now, and she would like to ass more work over to the Secretary if possible. AC said she had talked to DS and suggested different options for her to think over i.e. i) step down as Secretary but remain on the Committee ii) step down from the role and Committee and remain as a General Member, pointing out she could still come along to themeeting but would not have a vote.iii) remain on maternity leave and we get temporary cover (although not ideal due to the type of work) and resume as before on return. AC said also explainedto DS that CB had offered to continue on taking the minutes, and also offered to take over the Secretary role if needed.AC then read out the last email from DS, which stated that 'she would like to take a year off from her role and remain on the committee, coming back in January 2015, if still welcome'. A short discussion took place and then DF suggested that CB take over the Secretary role, and the situation re DS be reviewed at the end of the year. A show of hands showed general agreement it was then unanimously agreed that CB should not only take over the role of Minute Secretary but also the wider role of General Secretary.AC welcomed CB as joint Secretary and said wouldmeet with CB to go through the role and objectives etc.
3. Market Place event update and Feedback:
Following our health and Wellbeing Market Place event in March AC informed the committee that the stalls in the waiting area engendered more anticipation and interest from prospective stallholders. AC had emailed PPG members the report, drawn up by herself and Trevor Pybus from Community Connections, who kindly advised and assisted on the event. The report included feedback from stallholders, which showed mostly that this event was considered a great networking tool as well as a marketing too. AC also explained that all taking part agreed that having stalls during surgery opening hours would be of great interest to them.
4. Updates from last meeting on April 3rd
Weekly stalls -the committee were aware that the Friday morning stallsinitiative had been started by AC and that now, as suggested by D L, dates were being offered to groups and organisations every morning during surgery hours in orderto open the choice up out the committee approved invites to approx.AC said the diary for the stalls for Fridays isalready set up on a spreadsheet and needs to be changed to allow for the other days.50 possible stallholders, and several bookings been made. Some have booked more than one bookings,and some such as Health Watch and Community Connections are having a regularmonthly stall.AC said that she has asked stallholders to provide their 'Feed Back' which she will collect and collate to pass on for Information.
PPG Stalls- AC said that PPG had a stall as planned on Friday 6th June with GG andherself talking to patients, EW unfortunately being called away to a family emergency. The surgery was fairly quite thatmorning but managed to get 5 new members for PPG. AC suggested that it would be good to have the PPGstall more often than once a year, andperhaps a quarterly stall if sufficient volunteers to man it for PPG. All patient committee members agreed to participate.
It was suggested more advertising needed, perhaps put details on prescriptions, posters, etc. so that people would be better informed.
LP asked “with waiting time, is there anything that can be done?” DL said that there are a number of appointments, but, in the end, it is wait and see. If really urgent then patients can be put on as an “extra”. This could be discussed at the meeting next Thursday for all GP’s.
Also it was suggested if we had a larger market place event, as suggested by RJ, we could put a poster outsidethe “Green Man” so that cars stopped at the lights there could also read the information. AC reminded the group PPG haveno funds so limited on what we could do. The possibilityof Sponsorship was raisedand the question asked should this bea practice or the GP’s responsibility? CB said there are many organisations who may be willing to givegrants to NHS/ medically based projects and she would be happy to look into this which was agreed. AC said had tried to get sponsorship from supermarkets for themarket stall event in March with negative response, as appeared our project may be too small for them.
Collaborative working workshops- pooling knowledge - RJ said that perhaps we could contact other patient groups to see if they would like tocome on board with our market stalls idea. He suggested a larger venue being used for the Market Place, perhaps using the Phoenix building or nearby Church Hall, to allow more participants and a larger footfall by collaborating with other practices. AC said we had no details of other groups, and would need those to be able to make contact and a larger event such as that the event would be a community organised event. The GP’sPractice Managers will be sent the details to pass on. This could be either e-mails, letters, telephone etc. for comment/feedback. He also said there is an open GP meeting on 1st July and Richard Clements is Project Manager.
Suggestion Box- DLshowed us the suggestion box purchased which shehas now to arrange to be hung near the main reception. She said the new the man who does the building maintenance man will put it up onhopefully on Monday
Newsletter -AC said that RJ had kindly already provided Alex with a healthy recipe and this has already beenput into the 2nd issue newsletters. She reminded the committee that in order for the newsletter to be a success she need peoples contributions as she is finding it hard to get the variety of items to put in,so again appealed for help there.AC said Action point h) article on Catford Tennis still awaited. DL said 100 copies of the 2nd issuenewsletters were put in the waiting room and they have all gone. DF asked about the Newsletter on line and could a message be put on the screen. DL said that this was already in place. AC asked PLEASE look out for any items of interest for this – new groups, recipes, jokes, short anecdotes etc. . AC explained Dr. Kanapathy haswritten an article on Diabetes for thenewsletter which unfortunately was toolengthy, but has now edited it to become a leaflet, making in more visual, to encourage patients to pick up. DL is arranging for this to be printed out & put into the waiting area.
4. KPI's - Not yet done due to surgery workload. DL said to follow for attaching with minutes
5. Nurses/general members to meeting -DL informed the committee that SLGP had a new Nurse Manager starting on Monday – Nurse Ariana – and she will arrange for someoneto attend or give us some feedback if unable to come along.
AC said the invitation to general members to attend quarterly meetings went out by email and only AP had expressed interest, although unfortunately hadn’t attended. She said members will be reminded 1/2 can attend a meeting when being informing them of new meeting dates.
DF asked for the names of the Doctors. DL said that there was a list on display in the Meeting Room. DF then suggested something done to “welcome” new doctors and say “goodbye” and many thanks to those leaving, perhaps by using the waiting room screens. DL said she would consider this.
7. PPG Awareness - AC said PPG at SLGP now had 38 members, not including the GP staff. The question was asked 'Can we put an invitation on prescriptions to join a “virtual Membership” Group?' and DL said she thought possible and would look into this further.
9. AOB - speech Action pointcompleted AC confirmed the committee had been sent a copy of the speech.
5. Complaint statistics
DL said had no details to hand but few written complaints received thankfully. Others usually dealt with at the time of complaining. Any Problems or complaints received and dealt with between meetings can be itemised for discussion at the next meeting. All agreed.DL said she would collate details of any written complaints for next meeting in September.
6. Help if needed when booking in.
AC said that during the time she and GG spent on the PPG stall during PPG week GG had approached an elderly lady regarding joining the group. The lady mentioned to him that she could not read the board to see when time for her to go in for her appointment, and GG very kindly sat with her to watch for her until called. AC said she also had noticed a lady queuing holding a white stick. She asked what help patients with various problems could get when checking in. DL said the receptionists usually know the patients and their problems so are aware help would be needed and given. If anyone not known asked at reception they would also be helped as needed.
7. 111 Service
AC asked for an update on the 111 service because as far as aware all boroughs – EXCEPT Lambeth, Lewisham and Southwark are using this as an emergency number but other information seems to contradict this. DL said the 111 still seems to be causing problems and patients should phone Seldoc out of hours, pointing out that some of our GPs also work on that service so patients could see one of our own GP's. If needed patients could also try 111 however.
8. New members
ACsaid the PPG stall brought us 5 more members as previously stated and believed that now brought our membership up to approx. 38 now and DL expressed surprise saying that she believed that was the highest amount of PPG members in any local GP practice. All agreed as previously discussed we need and many patient on board as possible. AC also stated that we now had approx. 5 members not having pc access so she had hand delivered some items to their home address. GG kindly offered to act as 'delivery boy'to help in future which was gratefully accepted by AC.
9. The role of the PPG in patient education
AC asked if DL had any more information on the Patients on Line and also Patients on Line Workshops which she mentioned at our last meeting but DL did not have. DL and AC will go onto the Patients on Line and also the Patients on Line Workshops and ascertain if there are any problems
DL informed us that SLGP is trying to help minority groups by displaying posters/notices which may be relevant which to inform the GO if fasting ie for Ramadan etc, and informing patients there is a Prayer Mat available with quiet space if required.
Patient Appointment Understanding: DL said the system is not working at the moment and there are just no more appointments left. She said they are trying to help patients to understand that they should not make unnecessary appointments. Some patients abuse the system unfortunately, making appointments for minor health matters, advice and medication that can be obtained from a Pharmacist, and this practice is difficult to stop.
Various suggestions were put forward:- a “walk in” just for prescriptions. The time of 8 to 8.30 am for non-urgent 5 minute appointments re prescriptions, certificates etc. This would cater for about 6 people during that half hour. However, these appointments must NOT be allowed to run on longer than the allocated 5 minutes. It was asked, if the '5mins walk in'set up should this be “book on line” “walk in”?? AC said that she could set up a PPG leaflet to distribute re the short appointments as may make patients take notice if came from us instead of from the surgery.DL will bring the matter up at the next GP’s meeting.
AC asked if Beckenham Beacons Walk In Centre was still open as she had mixed information. DC said he was there only last week and DL said reports of its demise are greatly exaggerated. It is still there and dealing with patients.
10. SE London 5 year commissioning strategy.
ACexplained that she had been to the round table discussion held at Charlton football ground on 18th June (one of two discussion venues). The event was to gain information from a range of community based providers and individuals,and discuss the development of plans for SE London from the Clinical Leadership Groups (CLGs) on the 7 clinical elements of the strategy, looking at Health and services across SE London, and discussing the impact of any proposals they may be making. CLGGs cover primary and community care, Long term health condition - physical and mental health, planned care, urgent and emergency care, maternity, children and young people and cancer. AC said due to time restraints each participant could only choose to discuss 2topics, so chose the primary health and community care and long term health conditions as thought this covered more for our practice. AC provided the committee with a copy of her notes and information from the meeting and said would also provide a copy of the final collated feedback details from the event once received.
11. Any Other Business.
DL asked if we had acquired any more patients from new build properties around the surgery. DL said as far as aware not many at the moment but will let us know more by the next meeting.
DL informed the committee that SLGP had now renewed the NAPP Affiliation subscription.
The Meeting closed at 3.55 pm. The chair thanked everyone for attending. A finalised date for the next meeting has not been fixed but will be about the middle of September.
ACTION POINTSFOR COMMITTEE MEMBERS
(a) Ac and CB to meet up to discuss possibility of widerSecretarial role.
(b) AC to amend PPG stalls Friday spreadsheet to allow for other days
(c) AC to collate feedback from stallholders
(d) AC & CB to look into possibilities of funding/sponsorship.
(e) DL & RJ to send details of possible larger event to other GPs & PracticeManagers for feedback/comment
(f) DL to ask new maintenance man to hang suggestion box
(g) DC to write short article on Catford Wanders Tennis for newsletter
(h)Everyone to look for item for newsletter of interest to patients & pass to AC.
(i) LP (work experience) to provide a small article on her work experienceat SLGP for newsletter.
(j)DL to arrange printing & distributing Diabetes leaflet
(k) DL to arrange KPI's send to AC or CB to add to minutes.
(l) DL to ask Nurse Manager to attend or provide feedback for discussion at next meeting
(j) Alex to invite general members each time when sending details of next quarterly meetings.
(k) DL to consider use of screen in surgery for welcoming new doctors & saying farewell to those leaving practice.
(l)DL to look into possibility of putting put an invitation on prescriptions to forpatients join a “virtual PPG Membership” Group
(m) DL to collate details of any complaints for next meeting in September.
(n) GG to hand deliver details in future to those members not having pc access.
(o)DL and AC will go onto the Patients on Line, and also the Patients on Line Workshops to ascertain if there are any problems using site.
(p) Dl to bring the suggestion of '5 minute walk ins' for prescriptions up at the next GP’s meeting.
(q)AC to provide a copy of the copy of the final collated feedback details from the SE London 5 year commissioning strategy event once received.
(r)Dl to provide number of new patients for next meeting.
(S) AC & CB to arrange September quarter meeting with DL
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