All GP practices are required to declare the mean earnings (eg average pay) for GPs working to deliver NHS services to patients at each practice.

The average pay for GPs working in Cuckfield Medical Centre in the last financial year (2022/23) was £85,421 before tax and National Insurance. This is for 7 part time GPs who worked in the practice for more than six months.

We are a training Practice and as such we have GP Registrars and FY2 Doctors regularly in practice and you will be offered appointments with them. They are all qualified doctors and are all given supervision throughout their time at the practice.

Dr Ferrier and Dr Cotter are our current specialist GP trainers and Dr Bucher and Dr Whitehouse are both FY2 supervisors. At all times all of the trainer doctors will have a nominated supervisor throughout their placement.

Future (prospective) records access means patients can access information and data added to the patient record from a set date onwards. Access will be granted from the date the practice reviews your request form.

Part of the NHS England Future Vision was for all patients to have immediate access to their notes from 1st November 2023. We agree that this aim is ultimately a positive step in patient autonomy and engagement in their own care, however there are significant risks associated with a blanket policy where all patients over 18 have immediate access to their future notes.

As of yet, we feel that these risks have not been resolved and after advice from our governing bodies and discussion with our fellow PCN practices we have therefore made the decision that the safest way forward is to adopt an Opt In model of access.

The aim of this is to allow patients access in a systematic manner which allows us to review notes before release and protect potentially vulnerable patients. Access to prospective notes can be granted by written request to the practice.

We are sure that you all understand that clinical care will take priority over notes review and this process may therefore take up to 6 months for access to be granted after request. This process does not fall under the Subject Access Request for retrospective information access which has its own time frames for completion.

Not all requests for access may be considered safe and can be refused if it is felt access could be harmful. A routine appointment can be made to discuss these decisions.

To request access to your notes please complete the following form and bring it into the surgery with photo ID so we can confirm the identity of anyone making a request.

Medical records for children under the age of 16 years can be made available to their parents or legal guardians by proxy access.

Children age 16-18 years will need to request access to their own records.

We are aware that many patients already have real time access to their investigation results via the NHS App.

We would like to remind all patients that they may subsequently receive their results BEFORE they have been reviewed by the requesting clinician. This is completely outside of our control and is a system that has been set up by NHS England without consultation with us.

Whilst we endeavour to ensure all abnormal results are reviewed as quickly as possible, there may occasionally be an unavoidable delay in this.

Furthermore, some results may be marked as abnormal by the lab as they fall outside the reference ranges but this does not mean that they automatically require any action and it is up to the clinician to decide if these abnormalities are significant or not.

Please do not call the practice to discuss blood results as soon as you receive them as these calls block the phone lines and take up unnecessary receptionist and clinician time and takes us away from acute patient care.

If you have further queries after you have received the results AND they have been reviewed by a clinician, please complete an e-consult or send an email via reception with your questions which will be reviewed by clinicians based on clinical priority.

Patients going on holiday does NOT increase the clinical urgency and whilst we try take into account social & medical commitments affecting patients, we cannot guarantee that queries will be dealt with quicker because you have other commitments or are anxious about the results.

We ask that you do not call the surgery to discuss prospective online access as we need to keep the lines clear for clinical queries.

• Any requests for access need to be via the forms above which will need to be brought into the surgery along with photo ID.
• If you have other questions about access, please send these via email or letter.
• If you wish access to remain blocked (Opting Out), please email or write to us.

There are a number of patients who book their appointments, request repeat medication and can view certain parts of their medical records online.

Patient Access have now improved their system to allow parents and Carers to be authorised to all of the above-mentioned functions for children or the people they care for.

Any patient or Carer wishing to have proxy access will need to sign up to this service by completing a form available at the practice Reception.

Staff have the right to work in a safe and secure environment and we as employers have the legal responsibility of providing that environment. The Practice will not tolerate:

• Verbal abuse to staff which prevents them from doing their job or makes them feel intimidated or unsafe
• Threats of violence or actual violence to any member of the Practice

The GPs have the right to remove with immediate effect any patient who behaves in the above manner.

Zero Tolerance Practice Policy

INTRODUCTION

The Practice takes it very seriously if a member of staff is treated in an abusive or violent way.

The Practice supports the government’s ‘Zero Tolerance’ campaign for Health Service Staff. This states that GPs and their staff have a right to care for others without fear of being attacked or abused. To successfully provide these services a mutual respect between all the staff and patients has to be in place.

Our Practice staff aim to be polite, helpful, and sensitive to all patients’ individual needs and circumstances. They would respectfully remind patients that very often staff could be confronted with a multitude of varying and sometimes difficult tasks and situations, all at the same time.  The staff understand that ill patients do not always act in a reasonable manner and will take this into consideration when trying to deal with a misunderstanding or complaint.

However, aggressive behaviour, be it violent or abusive, will not be tolerated and may result in you being removed from the Practice list and, in extreme cases, the Police being contacted.

In order for the practice to maintain good relations with their patients the practice would like to ask all its patients to read and take note of the occasional types of behaviour that would be found unacceptable:

• Using bad language or swearing at practice staff
• Any physical violence towards any member of the Primary Health Care Team or other patients, such as pushing or shoving
• Verbal abuse towards the staff in any form including verbally insulting the staff
• Racial abuse and sexual harassment will not be tolerated within this practice
• Persistent or unrealistic demands that cause stress to staff will not be accepted. Requests will be met wherever possible and explanations given when they cannot
• Causing damage/stealing from the Practice’s premises, staff or patients
• Obtaining drugs and/or medical services fraudulently
• We ask you to treat your GPs and their staff courteously at all times.

The Legal Position

As a responsible employer, the Practice has a duty as a provider of NHS healthcare to protect the health, safety and welfare of staff under the Health & Safety at Work Act. This includes a risk assessment of violence towards staff and taking steps to mitigate this under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999.

Staff members who are victims of violent conduct or assault have the right to sue their employers for compensation if the risk of violence could have been reduced or removed completely, but the employers did not act upon this information.

Examples of security issues:

• Security of grounds and car parking
• Security of premises – incl. storage, “out of hours”
• CCTV
• Cash and staff – storing, handling and transferring
• Security Systems
• Security of equipment – medical devices, computers
• Communication of national security alerts
• Information records
• Contingency planning.
• Security of employees
• Staff working on their own
• (Staff can be lone workers when making domiciliary visits or within a hospital department e.g. out of hours)

This list is not exhaustive.

For example a lone working risk assessment must provide the lone worker full knowledge of the hazards and risks to which he or she is being exposed and what they must need to do will something go wrong. Other responsible persons must know the whereabouts of lone workers and what they are doing;

Violence at Work

The practice acknowledges that there may be instances where violence and / or aggression forms part of a patient’s illness. In these circumstances, the issue will be discussed with the patient and form part of their care planning.

This information will be recorded in the patient’s medical record and flagged to ensure that members of staff are aware. In addition, where deemed necessary, appropriate support will be put in place, e.g. staff members do not see the patient alone.

Definition of Physical and Verbal Abuse and Violence:

Physical and verbal abuse includes:

• Unreasonable and / or offensive remarks or behaviour / rude gestures / innuendoes
• Sexual and racial harassment
• Threatening behaviour (with or without a weapon)
• Actual physical assault (whether or not it results in actual injury) includes being pushed or shoved as well as being hit, punched or attacked with a weapon, or being intentionally struck with bodily fluids or excrement.
• Attacks on partners, members of staff or the public
• Discrimination of any kind
• Damage to an employee’s or employer’s property

The Practice supports the Zero Tolerance stance adopted by the NHS.

The HSE (Health and Safety Executive) defines work-related violence as:

“Any incident, in which a person is abused, threatened or assaulted in circumstances relating to their work”.

Violence and aggression towards a person may also be defined as:

“A physical contact with another person which may or may not result in pain or injury. The contact is uninvited and is an attempt to cause harm, injury or to intimidate. Non-physical aggression includes the use of language which causes offence or threatens the safety of a member of staff”.

Under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, the practice will also undertake the following measures to ensure a safe work environment:

• Carry our risk assessments to assess and review the duties of employees, identifying any “at risk” situations and taking appropriate steps to reduce or remove the risk to employees, particularly if they are working alone.
• Assess and review the layout of the premises to reduce the risk to employees where physically possible.
• Assess and review the provision of personal safety equipment, such as alarms.
• Develop surgery policies, procedures and guidelines for dealing with physical and verbal abuse.
• Provide support and counselling for victims, or refer to suitably qualified health professionals.
• Make employees aware of risks and ensure employee involvement in suitable training courses.
• Record any incidents on a Significant Event form and take any remedial action to ensure similar incidents are prevented in future.

REMOVAL FROM THE PRACTICE LIST

The removal of patients from our list is an exceptional and rare event and is a last resort in an impaired patient-practice relationship. We value and respect good patient-doctor relationships based on mutual respect and trust. When trust has irretrievably broken down, the practice will consider all factors before removing a patient from their list, and communicate to them that it is in the patient’s best interest that they should find a new practice. An exception to this is in the case of immediate removal on the grounds of violence e.g. when the Police are involved.

Removing other members of the household

Because of the possible need to visit patients at home, it may be necessary to terminate responsibility for other members of the family or the entire household to ensure the safety of practice staff.

The prospect of visiting patients that is the residence of a relative who is no longer a patient of the practice, or the risk of being regularly confronted by the removed patient, may make it difficult for the practice to continue to look after the whole family. This is more likely where the removed patient has been violent or displayed threatening behaviour, and keeping the other family members could put doctors or their staff at risk.