Patient Participation Group

 

The Patient Participation Group at St James Medical Centre meet quarterly to discuss Practice issues and patient experience to improve the Service provision.

Purpose of a PPG:

  • To give patients and Practice staff the opportunity to meet and discuss topics of mutual interest.
  • To provide a means for patients to become more involved and make suggestions about the services they receive
  • To contribute feedback to the Practice on National Patient Survey results and Family and Friends Test feedback, to propose developments or change.
  • To promote health awareness and patient education.

St James Medical Centre is spread over two sites- Croydon and New Addington. We have representative from both sites as members of the PPG. We have a Chair person who sends out the Agenda according to the need of the patients and Practice. They have been actively involved in improving the DNA rates. They were made aware that on one hand there has been a need for appointments and on the other hand we had patients who DNA’ed the given appointments. PPG members felt this was an area that they could be actively involved in and initiated by drafting a letter which is sent to the patients and have also been involved in writing the DNA Policy. 

The other major area that they worked on was towards improving access for the patients at Castle Hill Surgery. A survey was conducted and currently major construction changes are being made to improve accessibility for patients with pushchairs and wheelchair.

PPG in this practice are proactive in initiating and developing various service provisions like attending educational talks and improving staff safety by liaising with MP’s to improve street lighting. They are a great support for our staff and patients.

If you would like to join our PPG group and help share services and provide feedback which will help drive improvements, please contact us via our secure online form

Latest PPG Minutes

Date: 23rd September 2022

Members present: Dr Sangeeta, Dr Ravi, Jennet, Nimmi, Meera and Jayne

Agenda: show our PPG members how our appointment system works so that they have a clearer picture. This way they will be able to use this information to educate the patients.

  • Team showed Meera and Jayne how our appointments and the Triage system works.
  • Patients are allocated to the Nurses, Physiotherapist, paramedics, Physician Associates, Mental Health Practitioners, pharmacist. Apart from this we were also sending our patients to the Hub doctors. This service provision is funded by us.
  • We also run various clinics throughout the year for example flu clinics, diabetes clinic, Learning disability clinics.
  • We continued to see patients throughout the Covid period. Some of the doctors worked from home offering telephone appointments as well as video consultations. Other doctors were on site. Our admin staff were all at the practice working.
  • Dr Ravi spoke about how now a lot of responsibilities from the Secondary care is being passed on to Primary care. This has increased our workload to a large extent.
  • Meera enquired about how the system would work for example if she needed an appointment and we walked through the whole process with her explaining from the beginning how it is triaged till being seen.
  • We explained about the new regulations around extended hours. The expectation would be to offer the Service 8am – 8pm weekdays and 8-5 during the weekend. We will be offering this service provision from a different Practice and this service too is fully funded by us.
  • Towards the end the PPG members had an idea of why we feel overwhelmed seeing how much work goes on behind the scene.
  • This information will be disseminated by the PPG Chairpersons to all the members.
  • Meera and Rakesh will decide on a date for the PPG meeting and send out an invite.