A GP practice in Thurnscoe which delivers services for more than 11,500 patients across the area has been told that it ‘requires improvement’ following its latest Care Quality Commission inspection.

The Dearne Valley Group Practice, based in the Thurnscoe Centre on Holly Bush Drive, was the subject of a CQC inspection from February 26 to March 4 with the report being made public recently.

There are five categories in which the CQC focuses on during the inspection caring, responsive, well-led, effective and safety.

The final two were rated as ‘requires improvement’ while the others were rated ‘good’.

However the service has been told that it requires improvement overall due to the shortcomings noticed during the inspection.

The report said that more needed to be done to keep patients safe.

It said: “Patients’ needs were not always assessed, and care and treatment was not always delivered in line with current legislation, standards and evidence-based guidance supported by clear pathways.

“Patients on high-risk medicines were not always recalled for monitoring in a timely manner.

“Systems and processes for dealing with MHRA alerts and safeguarding procedures were not completely effective and required strengthening.

“Managers told us that at the direction of their local ICB they used a clinical search system called Eclipse.

“However, this did not always identify patients requiring regular monitoring or follow up, such as those with long term conditions or prescribed high risk medicines.

“We expect all GP Practices to have systems in place to review these patients in line with best practice guidance.

“The service had a good learning culture and people could raise concerns.

“Managers investigated incidents thoroughly.

“Staff understood and managed risks.

“The facilities and equipment met the needs of people, were clean and well-maintained and any risks mitigated.”

The report added that two dozen patients who were supposed to be monitored by the service had not been contacted.

“The service did not always make sure that medicines and treatments were safe and met people’s needs, capacities and preferences,” the report added.

“They did not always involve people in planning.

“We found that, although some systems were in place to ensure patients were recalled, processes and procedures requiring strengthening to avoid potential harm for patients.

“Through searches we ran on the practice’s clinical system we identified that there was not a robust system in place for monitoring patients on an Aldosterone Antagonist.

“This is medicine used to treat high blood pressure and heart failure.

“We identified 24 patients that were potentially overdue monitoring.

“We looked in detail at five patient records and found that all five were overdue monitoring.

“All five patients were also overdue medicine reviews.

“We found that current systems in place did not identify patients who were on ACE inhibitors or Angiotensin II receptor blockers from receiving the required monitoring.

“This is medicine used to treat blood pressure abnormalities.

“We identified that 15.5 per cent of patients on this medicine potentially required monitoring.”

The practice was contacted for a comment but failed to provide one before our deadline.