Swindon GP surgery goes into special measures

Inspectors found staff did not have the necessary skills, knowledge or experience to do their jobs

A GP surgery in Swindon has been rated as inadequate and its provider, which runs four other surgeries locally, has been placed under urgent conditions.

Abbey Meads Village Centre which is run by IMH Ltd was inspected in June by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).

Inspectors found the surgery staff lacked the necessary skills, knowledge and experience to do their jobs.

The practice and IMH have been approached for comment.

The IMH Ltd had "significant issues" over its patient safety across its four other surgeries: Moredon Medical Centre; Taw Hill Surgery; Eldene Surgery and Phoenix (Toothill) Surgery).

Other concerns relate to the quality of service, leadership and governance.

In terms of Abbey Meads, failings included, "not keeping accurate information to keep people safe, or make improvements when things went wrong".

'Deeply sad'

CQC inspector, Ruth Rankine, said: "While it is good to see that staff are still providing a caring service at Abbey Meads Village Centre there needs to be an urgent overall improvement within the practice for the sake of its patients.

"Clearly there are areas which we found unsafe particularly around the management medicines."

Since the five surgeries were taken over by IMH, patients have faced huge problems booking appointments.

Four of the five surgeries are now in special measures, and Taw Hill has requires improvement rating.

Dr Peter Swinyard who works at the Phoenix surgery said: 'I'm very sad that the changes have been clumsily enacted and that the patients have been having a terrible time getting appointments.

"Longstanding partners have left and have not been replaced and this has reduced the quality.

"I am deeply sad. At Phoenix, we are still trying to provide the best service we can and we look forward to a time when we can move to a different organisation."