Enter and view: Allerton Road Medical Centre

Healthwatch Hackney conducted an Enter and View visit to Allerton Road Medical Centre, on 31/07/2017, following comments from service users received during routine comment collections across various health venues in Hackney which suggested that a visit would contribute to service improvement.

The Healthwatch Hackney Authorised Representatives found that most patients reported that dealing with reception staff was easy; they are polite and helpful and felt listened to and respected by their Doctors. However, some patients mentioned experiencing differences in treatment by locum GPs and felt it was difficult to see their preferred GP.

While patients reported dissatisfaction with the long wait for non-emergency appointments, most were happy with the easy access to emergency appointments. Some patients commented that they would say they needed an emergency appointment to ensure they were seen in a reasonable time.

The report makes 11 recommendations including the Practice considering taking steps to address some of the patient reported inconsistencies in treatment from different GPs and that patient focused training be provided for all clinical staff in the practice to improve consistency and quality of the care that patients receive from practitioners. The report also suggested that the practice considers reviewing its telephone appointment system and introducing an extra line for better patient access to the service.

The Practice provided a thorough response outlining practices that were already in place to address some of the concerns, and have provided an action plan to address others including pending changes to the telephone system, and changes to the staff rota to enable more staff to answer phones at peak time.