GP surgery management suspended due to harm risk

Two patients had incorrectly been recorded as having stage four chronic kidney disease instead of stage five

A care provider at a GP surgery has been suspended from treating patients after being rated inadequate by a health watchdog.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) said it had taken urgent action to suspend the provider, lead by Dr Sacha Simon, at The Whitestone Surgery in Nuneaton as it believed people were at risk of significant harm if it did not do so.

Caretaker arrangements have been put in place to ensure there was no loss of service to people who needed treatment.

The surgery told the BBC it did not want to comment.

Inspectors found some patient's illnesses had not been recorded correctly and others given a misdiagnosis.

The surgery was found to have incorrectly recorded two people with stage five chronic kidney disease, the end stage, as having stage four.

One of the two patients had not been reviewed since 2012, which the CQC said could potentially be fatal as they may not have received the correct treatment.

Four people had a missed diagnosis of diabetes and people were not being given the correct dosage of steroid for their asthma.

"This is unacceptable because it places people at risk of their diabetes or asthma deteriorating and leading to irreversible complications," the health watchdog said.

Inspectors also found:

• No clear leadership or structure at the practice and nothing in place to support good management of the practice

• Some staff were working beyond their capabilities

• The practice did not hold any emergency medicines.

The focused inspection was carried out to follow up on information of concern that had been received about the practice.

Whitestone Surgery's overall rating has now dropped from good to inadequate, as have the ratings for safe, effective, responsive, and well-led.

Caring has dropped from good to requires improvement.

Amanda Lyndon, CQC deputy director of operations in the Midlands, said: "When we inspected Whitestone Surgery, we found a practice where the provider couldn’t demonstrate they had the capacity or skills to deliver safe, high-quality care for people who used the practice."

Ms Lyndon also said it was incredibly worrying to find that there were over 200 pathology reports dating back to December 2020 that had not been reviewed or actioned, 51 of which showed abnormal results.

There were more than 900 documents awaiting processing, including out of hours reports and clinical documents which needed reviewing and filing into people’s records, or consulted on the findings.

"It is completely unacceptable that leaders have let important paperwork issues get so out of hand," she said.

“This practice was delivering care and treatment, unsafely, and way below the standards people should be able to accept, which left us with no option but to use our enforcement powers and suspend them from operating."

She said the CQC would not lift the suspension until it was assured patients would receive safe and effective care.

The BBC has approached The Whitestone Surgery for comment.

The Coventry and Rugby GP Alliance are now running services at the surgery.