• Doctor
  • GP practice

West Pottergate Medical Practice

Earlham Road, Norwich, NR2 4BX (01603) 513333

Provided and run by:
West Pottergate Medical Practice Limited

Important: The provider of this service changed - see old profile

Inspection summaries and ratings from previous provider

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Background to this inspection

Updated 9 December 2019

West Pottergate Medical Centre is located in Norwich, Norfolk, within the West Pottergate Health Centre which is shared with other providers of health services.

The practice is registered with the CQC to carry out the following regulated activities; diagnostic and screening procedures, surgical procedures, family planning, maternity and midwifery services and treatment of disease, disorder or injury.

The practice has a contract with the Norwich Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) to provide Personal Medical Services (PMS).

The practice is open from 8.30am to 6pm on Monday to Friday with early morning appointments available on a Wednesday from 7.30am.

Out of hours services are provided through the NHS111 service.

When the practice is closed patients are directed to NHS111 for urgent and emergency healthcare needs. Patients can also access a local NHS walk-in service daily between 9am and 7pm.

The practice is part of a wider primary care network (PCN) of GP practices in Norwich.

At the time of our inspection there were 4,347 patients on the practice list.

The practice is led by two GP partners supported by a practice manager. The clinical team includes one salaried GP, one advanced nurse practitioner (ANP) and two healthcare assistants (HCA). The practice non-clinical team includes a lead receptionist and six administrative and reception staff.

The practice is in an area of Norwich with mixed deprivation levels; the practice catchment area is ranked five on the deprivation measurement scale with one being the most deprived and ten the least deprived. People living in more deprived areas tend to have greater need for health services.

National General Practice Profile describes the practice ethnicity as being 91.9% white, 3.6% Asian, 1.3% black, and 2.4% mixed race and 0.7% other races. The practice demographics show the practice population age range percentages are in in line with averages across England. Average life expectancy is 80 years for men and 83 years for women compared to the national average of 79 and 83 years respectively. The general practice profile shows that 60% of patients registered at the practice have a long-standing health condition, compared to 51% locally and 51% nationally.

Overall inspection

Good

Updated 9 December 2019

We carried out an inspection of this service due to the length of time since the last inspection.

Following our annual review of the information available to us, including information provided by the practice, we focused our inspection on the following key questions:

  • Are services effective?
  • Are services well-led?

Because of the assurance received from our review of information we carried forward the ratings for the following key questions:

  • Are services at this location safe?
  • Are services at this location caring?
  • Are services at this location responsive?

We based our judgement of the quality of care at this service on a combination of:

  • what we found when we inspected
  • information from our ongoing monitoring of data about services and
  • information from the provider, patients, the public and other organisations.

We have rated this practice as good overall and good for all population groups.

We found that:

  • Patients received effective care and treatment that met their needs.
  • The way the practice was led and managed promoted the delivery of high-quality, person-centred care.

We received 20 CQC Comments cards which were wholly positive about the service and showed that patients felt the practice was welcoming, caring and friendly and that staff were good at listening, professional and helpful.

Whilst we found no breaches of regulations, the provider should:

  • Review the provision of services for the cervical cancer screening programme to improve uptake rates in line with the national target of 80% uptake.
  • Continue in efforts to review and where appropriate reduce the rates of exception reporting for people experiencing poor mental health (including people with dementia).

Details of our findings and the evidence supporting our ratings are set out in the evidence tables.

Dr Rosie Benneyworth BM BS BMedSci MRCGP

Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care