PPG Meeting Minutes

November 2022

Welcome and Apologies

No apologies received.

Previous Minutes

Minutes of the meeting held on July 4th 2022 Minutes of the meeting held on Tuesday 13th December 2022 were approved.

Practice Update

DM updated the PPG on the current staffing.

The practice has struggled with GP sickness and currently we have 2 GPs on long-term leave.  Dr Heaney was a 6 sessional GP and her sessions have not yet been replaced.  However, the practice is pleased to be able to welcome Dr Lucy Craven as a 4 sessional GP in December.  We are very fortunate that we have some excellent locum doctors who like working for us and give a some continuity to our patients.

The administrator team have had significant problems with patients refusing to see any GP other than own GP.  Unfortunately, due to GP sickness it has meant that our own GPs have needed to be duty doctor more often than once a week as this is a role locum doctors do not do.  This has meant that there are less slots available for these doctors.  We are able to offer appointments with an alternative GP and we are trying to educate patients that any GP they see will have full access to their medical records.

Sarah has moved to our nursing team from the admin team and is now trained in phlebotomy and immunisations and has her own clinics.

We have lost one member of the admin team due to childcare difficulties and a new person will be starting in December.

Over the last few weeks we have changed the way we answer our phones. Between 8am and 9am all administration staff will be answering the phones as previously.  After this time, the number of staff answering phones will be reduced to enable our team to do the existing admin work, for example arranging blood tests, follow up appointments, long term condition appointments, answer queries etc.  We recognise it is frustrating for patients to wait, however we need to put some priority on the existing work load and will aim to answer all phone calls within 15 minutes.  There is also a call back option for patients.

As a practice, we do recognise that there has needed to be some changes in the way we offer our service.  The most important thing, is patient safety, and this is always a driving factor in any change.  I am grateful to the PPG for helping to advise patients why there is a need to make these changes.

Lloyds Pharmacy update

SL has been requesting support for Budleigh residents regarding their pharmacy and the issues regarding unrequested closures due to a lack of pharmacist since 04/11/2021.  The town has 2 pharmacy licences which is the maximum allowed for the population size.  Currently both licences are held by Lloyds who advise that the businesses are independent of each other.

There is a meeting arranged for 10/11/2022 with following people invited:

• Rebecca Harty, Devon ICB
• Sue Lake, Chairperson Budleigh PPG
• Kathryn Blurton, Clinical Practice Manager, Budleigh Salterton Medical Centre
• Gill Munday, Devon ICB
• Sue Taylor, Devon LPC
• Jenny Collins, NHS England
• Karina Hall, Hallo Healthcare (ie Lloyds)
• Barry Coakley, WEB PCN Clinical Director

SL will report back to the PPG following this meeting and will update members with the email address where any issues can be sent to.

SL and CK attended an interview for the local Journal but version of the interview posted online was full of inaccuracies and has now been removed. 

MM has suggested a petition and SL will mention this at the meeting.

Family and Friends Tests

MR has distributed a precis of the latest results.  It is disappointing to have so few patients responding.  DM sends a random 450-500 texts at the start of every month to patients who have had a consultation in the previous month.

MM has suggested a more targeted survey which could be distributed in the practice.  SL has asked for members to put forward suitable questions at the next meeting.

DM has advised that the practice has as targeting phlebotomy survey which is due to be distributed in December.

Winter Newsletter

This will be ready for distribution by Tuesday 6th December 2020 and SL will advise DM nearer the time re the number of copies for printing.

Correspondence

No correspondence for this meeting

Any other business

PPG Noticeboard – SL has asked if this could be updated with the latest PPG newsletter.