South Cheshire’s best and worst GP surgeries, as rated by patients, have been revealed – and Kiltearn Medical Centre in Nantwich comes bottom of the class, writes Stephen Topping.
Patients in England were sent questionnaires to take part in the GP Patient Survey between January and March.
More than 1,940 patients responded from the NHS South Cheshire clinical commissioning group (CCG) area – which covers Nantwich, Crewe, Sandbach, Alsager and Middlewich.
The Surgery, in Wrenbury, has been ranked as the best practice in the area, with 99% of patients who responded saying they have a good overall experience – well above the national average of 84%.
But The Kiltearn Medical Centre, based at the Church View primary care centre (pictured) in Nantwich, was the lowest-ranked practice by patients who responded, with 75% saying they have a good overall experience.
A spokesman at NHS South Cheshire CCG said: “The GP patient survey is one of many tools that we use to monitor patient experience and access to GP services.
“The survey reinforces that patients trust GP services to deliver quality care.
“We are working closely with practices to explore new technologies that make it a lot easier for patients to book appointments and prescriptions online with their practice, and support extended access to GP appointments.”
The survey evaluates each GP practice on patients’ experience of making appointments, waiting times, perceptions of care at appointments, practice opening hours, and out-of-hours services.
At The Surgery in Wrenbury, 99% of respondents were satisfied with their experience of making an appointment, and they also found it easy to get hold of someone on the phone.
However, Dr Jonathan Griffiths, chairman of NHS Vale Royal CCG, has previously criticised the GP Patient Survey.
In a post on his blog called Best and Worst?, the Winsford GP said: “While I understand that people want information about the kind of service they can expect to receive in any one particular surgery compared to others in the town, you need to remember that it can be like comparing apples with oranges.
“The geographical location of each practice along with quirky historical preferences by patients means that every practice has a unique demographic make-up.
“The ability of the practice to meet the needs and expectations of the population it serves therefore varies considerably.”
A spokesperson for Kiltearn Medical Centre: “We echo the comments of Dr Jonathon Griffiths which highlight the shortcomings of the GP survey and the difficulties in interpreting raw data.”
The overall GP Patient Survey 2018 results for South Cheshire:
The Surgery – 99%
The Cedars – 97%
Greenmoss – 96%
Oaklands – 93%
Audlem – 92%
Ashfields – 91%
Rope Green – 90%
Merepark – 90%
Millcroft – 85%
Haslington – 85%
Hungerford – 85%
Nantwich – 83%
Tudor – 79%
Earnswood – 78%
Grosvenor – 78%
Waters Edge – 76%
Kiltearn – 75%
My wife and I have been cared for by the staff of the Kiltearn Medical Centre since coming to live in Nantwich twenty years ago. We are disappointed to read several adverse criticisms, particularly because our experiences have been so positive. We want to redress the balance by mentioning our latest experience in the middle of this Covid crisis. At the beginning of this week, we were invited to attend the Civic Hall for our vaccinations and already we have received them. The medical staff were delightful, professional and reassuring and the organisation couldn’t have been better. Not only was there an excellent back-up administrative team, but were pleased to see how many public-minded volunteers were in evidence to offer support and guidance. The whole experience was exactly what we have come to accept as normal at the Kiltearn Health Centre and in Nantwich town.
I think kiltern is excellent. Drs very helpful, receptionists helpful n caring. Awful to see it get bad press. How demoralizing for them. Bad statistics n league tables discouraging people who are helping us. Thank u kiltern!
Mark Whitield, you have clearly and concisely demolished these nonsensical figures.
Haha, there still is a three week wait, and only a Monday is available!!
Stop blaming the staff and the centre for being oversubscribed, underfunded and over worked. I’ve always received a quality service from Kiltearn. I moved from Manchester to Nantwich and there it was a three week wait for an appointment.
The NHS is a free service the complainers and negative reviewers should appreciate what they have. Write to your MP and campaign for more funding so they can have more staff to service the needs. Remember we have an older population and health needs are increased. Stop kicking the people that help you!
The NHS is not a free service it is funded by taxpayers money, so we all have a right to comment. Any additional funding, which it does need, should come from incompetant government wastage.
By wastage you mean things like ministers perks I presume, Expenses, subsides food and drink, ministerial carsetc
I once had to go in there and tell them to move a box of used needles off an upstairs windowsill.
The window was open and the blind was closed. A gust of wind and the lot could have landed on someone on the footpath
Extend the open hours respect the customer when they phobe and make it easier to see someone.
The team are great and I have had no problem once past reception….
If the Kiltearn could sort out the issues around booking appointments I believe it would rate much higher as, from my experience, the staff are friendly, helpful and efficient.
Mark Whitfield has captured my thoughts entirely.
Personally, I have the highest regard for the team at Kiltern MC.
We should value the dedicated professionals who care for us.
I find it hard to believe Rope Green is 90%.
The biggest Issue is not being able to get thru on phone line!!!! Busy, busy, busy but the Doctors do a top job, reception, nurses, and reception team fantastic.
Kiltearn is O.K. once you are there but getting an appointment is either constantly phoning first thing in a morning until you manage to get an answer or booking an appointment in advance which can be weeks away or a telephone appointment which only works if you have a condition which doesn’t need looking at.
This is a poorly written misleading article that is essentially click-bait. It contains mistakes and half truths and really does the trade of journalist no credit.
Dr Griffiths is not the Chair of South CCG. He is the chair of a different CCG entirely.
The article pulls one figure from the GP survey only – if you look at the proper survey and I encourage you to – https://www.gp-patient.co.uk/report?w=1&practicecode=N81047 You will see that Kiltearn actually scores better than the national average on many of its indicators and overall is certainly not the “worst” surgery. In some it achieves 99% satisfaction. Ok in some it could do better and im sure they agree with that and are trying. there is also the motto you cant please all of the people all of the time!
Then there is the validity of the survey itself. It is based on 177 responses – given 13000 patients this is quite a small sample size. Also given “complainers” tend to respond more than non-complainers there is an inherent bias to report poor scores. Also mathematically only a few votes make a small difference in score – hardly reflective of real life experience.
Its interesting to note that the practices who score better – are those that are funded better – wrenbury is a dispensing practice – it can make money from selling drugs – most cant – with this extra income they can hire more doctors. more doctors mean happier pts. the biggest factor locally from practice to practice – is the number of doctors per head of population and this is linked to funding.
The reality is there are numerous statistics Kiltearn could and probably should publish to show – the level of work they do, the quality of the work they provide and the demand they are under – most will show a hard working practice doing it best – doing well in a difficult landscape.
Lets address this – Nantwich has had massive new build, an increasingly elderly population, an increasingly complex world of healthcare, an increasing push of work onto general practice – has the surgery had more funding? no – its had less. year on year – as all gp practices – its had less funding. on top of a workforce crisis due to poor government planning. you get what you pay for.
Finally morale – is kicking the staff (its not just GPs its nurses, HCAs, receptionists) – in a world of austerity, crazy political targets and constant reorganisations really going to help? whats going to happen is the staff will walk away and then where will you be? A&E..
Excellent points raised
You have to wonder if the issue at Church View Primary Care Centre is systemic, none of the practices there are rated particularly well.
Thankfully Im not a patient there myself but from what Ive heard from people who are Im surprised it got ratings as high as it did
Unhelpful and simplistic. Our experience of Kiltearn (for nearly 20 years) has always been good.