Feb. 10, 2025
Agenda
The House Partnership PPG - Including HEALTH CHAMPIONS
NOTES OF MEETING HELD ON 10th February 2025 AT 6.30PM
Present:
Dr Josie York (Dr Y – Greystone House) Dr Sana Hassan ( Dr H - Moat House) Dr Pramit Patel (for part of meeting) Jacquie Clayson - Operations Manager (JC) Rachel Lynch - Practice Manager GH (RL) Chairman (FC) Treasurer (LAR) CH (Health Champion) SM RA JS TS LM JH LM NQ JW
Apologies:
MS (R&B Councillor)
KH
BT
FC welcomed everybody to the meeting. FC also announced that JR, a member and supporter of our PPG over many years had recently passed away. We have been in touch with her husband ER, to offer our condolences and FC plans to attend the funeral scheduled for Monday 17th February at Surrey & Sussex Crematorium.
Minutes
Finance Report.
LAR advised that the current balance stands at £465.75 after a payment of £118.75 representing proceeds from the sale of knitted items produced by JS. LAR thanked JS for her valued contribution.
Practice News
Rachel updated the meeting on the news from the surgery as follows:-
Staff Changes:-
Two new Moat House reception team members are completing their training at Greystone House to improve consistency across each Practice.
Two new GPs are working at GH, Drs Curpanen and Thavenesan as the final part of their training. Two new staff members Claire and Sonia have joined the GH Receptionist team. In addition two new nurses have joined GH, Gaby and Molly. Gaby has come from the Gastroenterology Department at East Surrey Hospital and Molly used to be a Specialist Dental
Nurse and is now completing her Care Certificate to become a Health Care Assistant. She is also working as the Nurse Team Liaison to streamline communication between the reception and nursing teams at GH. Sharon Whitmore, a Practice Nurse from MH is temporarily working at GH every Wednesday to help with providing cervical screening and childhood immunisation appointments.
General
Overall, GH house has been very busy since Christmas with high patient demand. Whilst it has been busy, resources have been deployed efficiently to cope with demand.
There has been a slight change to the online services as these are not now available outside practice opening times. Patients may contact the practice via the NHS App or website during normal opening times.
A grant has been received from our local authority for the surgery to issue taxi vouchers to patients up until 31st March to enable taxi services to be provided to immobile patients, patients without access to a vehicle or patients without adequate funds for public transport to get to and from the surgery or other secondary care appointments. Patients are continually encouraged to interact with the Practice via the NHS App
The GP Federation affiliation for the House Partnership is transferring from Alliance for Better Care (ABC) to Dorking Health Care (DHC) in April 2025. The GP Federations assist practices in delivering some services to patients however patients should not notice any big changes. The merger of Caterham Valley Medical Practice (CV) has been completed at Partnership level from 1st October 2024 however the merger of Patient records at CV to provide one overall patient record database across the House Partnership is now anticipated to take place during April 2026 as the window for this April has now closed.
Teamwork across the GH and MH surgeries is being developed and fostered with regular interchange of staff to encourage consistency of working across both sites.
There are still digital buddy NHS app sessions at Moat House surgery every Wednesday 12-2pm to help patients re-join who lost access when the practices merged.
JH (MH) enquired the reasons behind the amalgamations with other surgeries stating that he had seen no benefit so far. JC explained that national pressures are forcing more GP practices to merge for a number of reasons including improved administration, enhanced services/treatments flexibility and reduced burden of reporting activity back to NHS. Dr H also explained that minor surgery will now be undertaken at MH after a period of Doctor training at GH meaning that this will now be available across both sites.
Health Champions
CH provided an update as follows:-
· Weekly walks continue to be well attended each Wednesday morning with refreshments afterwards at the surgery. In reply to a question from the meeting, when bad weather has been encountered it has sometimes been necessary to hold the sessions indoors at GH surgery. Some patients at MH have also joined the walking group.
· Digital Buddy sessions are ongoing at GH on Wednesdays 10:30-11:30 before the weekly walk whereby patients are guided in how to use the NHS app to full advantage. These sessions have been well received.
· First Aid courses – several have been organised with the next session scheduled for Saturday 8th March 10am-12pm for parents and carers of babies and children and Thursday 20th March 7-9pm General First Aid. Contact the Health Champions or Rachel Lynch for further details.
Any Other Business
In response to a question from the meeting, Dr Y explained the impact and reasoning behind the collective action being undertaken by all GP practices in East Surrey. Dr Y confirmed that the action is not specifically aimed at patients but is a policy of not undertaking tasks or actions that are outside of the GP contract with the NHS. The GP view is that increasing responsibilities are being heaped on primary care without recognition or a corresponding uplift in the payment mechanism by NHS England. GPs feel undervalued and demoralised with many choosing early retirement. Individual GPs may act according to their conscious in determining what they consider is safe for their patient with no pressure on them to comply with the action. (NOTE – this contrasts with the declared aim of Wes Streeting, our new Health Secretary to move more care/diagnosis towards primary care).
RL also explained what is happening about the NHS Diagnostic Centre under construction in the Belfry shopping centre in Redhill. Surprisingly, (or not given the bureaucracy of the NHS), GP practices have not been informed about this development nor is it clear whether the funding and management will come from Surrey & Sussex NHS Trust, Surrey Heartlands Integrated Care Board or NHS England. Overall, this development is to be welcomed but it would be nice if the NHS right hand could be introduced to the left hand. It is believed the unit is part of the national Community Diagnostic Centre (CDC) Programme, which to date as opened 165 CDC sites across England. They offer patients a wide range of diagnostic tests closer to home and greater choice on where and how they are undertaken, reducing the need for hospital visits and potentially expediting the start of treatment. We do not know which type of diagnostic centre the Redhill centre will be yet, however it should focus on either - Imaging; CT, MRI, Ultrasound and X-Ray, Pathology, Endoscopy or ‘Physiological Science’ e.g. ECG, Blood Pressure Monitoring, Spirometry etc.
The issue of representative and increased membership was again discussed. Any suggestions please to FC or LAR. The issue as to whether we should have one PPG across the House Partnership or whether we should maintain separate PPGs for each surgery was discussed. These are early days but it seems logical to have one PPG across the patch. What are the views of members?