Lakeside St Neots PPG Meeting Minutes - Monday 15th January 2024

Introduction by Angela Gee

• Following the resignation of Nigel Ogilvie in December, Angela has taken over as Chair and Jonathan as her deputy.  Helen will take on the role of Treasurer

Explanation of Lakeside Balanced Scorecard (BSC) statistics

• Copies of BSC for October 2023 were handed out.  These are produced by Lakeside central office and are issued retrospectively.  Dr Murphy will ask Lakeside if they can expedite the production and distribution of the BSC.
• Post meeting note:  BSC are produced 4 weeks in arrears so will be able to share February data at the March meeting
• Phone and online appointments showed an upward trend in September. Dr Murphy explained that one Doctrin case only now takes 1 slot of time, whereas previously each stage of a case was allocated a slot, so this has freed up more appointment time. A slot is now 15 minutes rather than 10 which enables GP’s to complete the admin for each case eg referrals, correspondence etc. However patient demand for appointments still outstrips supply.
• The practice has 21,000 registered patients and this number hasn’t so far increased due to the new housing in St Neots. The practice has been involved in discussions about the planned local population increase.  The practice doesn’t hold information on numbers of patients who transfer to other local practices. 
• DNA numbers increased in September following a drop in August.  This is a problem which all surgeries have.

Priorities for change to improve patient satisfaction 

• The PPG expressed concerns about the low satisfaction ratings in the 2023 NHS patient survey, particularly when compared to some other local practices.  The hope is for improvement when the survey is next carried out.
• A text message is sent to patients following GP appointments to encourage positive feedback and there are feedback forms in Reception.  
• The PPG suggested a rating system to record patient satisfaction in future.
• The PPG gave Dr Murphy a copy of a letter which was posted on the local Facebook site in December.  The letter was from Anthony Browne MP to Andrea Leadsom at the DOH, expressing concern about GP provision in St Neots.
• The PPG intends to set up its own Facebook page in order to gather feedback and comments from other patients and to feed these back to the practice.
• It was noted that staff are advising patients who cannot get an appointment by phone or via Doctrin, to go to the surgery at 8.00am.  However the phone lines are open then and they will not get priority for appointments.
• Dumbelton Medical Centre successfully opened at the end of October 2023.
• The PPG expressed a hope that with the increased number of partners, patients would have more continuity of care by being able to see the same GP.
• The practice has most of the local care homes registered.  It has links with the Alzheimers Society for dementia care. It also has a remote clinical pharmacist who specialises in diabetes care.

Personnel Structure 

• The practice now has 6 partners - Four full time, one  80% and one 50%. In addition, three paramedics and two advance nurse practitioners, two pharmacists and five social prescribers.  A new Registrar is starting soon to replace one who has just left.
• Lakeside is part of St Neots Primary Care Network (PCN) which includes the walk-in Centre and Gt Staughton practice. The PCN is funded separately from the GP practice and practitioners split their working time between all surgeries.
• The practice is currently looking at how to replace the West Cambs Federation Extended Access service.

Anima Implementation

• Go live date is  8 February.  Doctrin will be shut down from the 1 February.  This will increase phone calls during that week.
• St Neots staff have Anima training next week.
• Patients are being informed via the website and Facebook as well as leaflets in the surgery.  This information includes YouTube videos of how to use the system.  Eventually there may be ipads available in Reception to demonstrate the system.
• Those patients who are comfortable with using an online platform are encouraged to use it in order to free up time for patients who are unable or unwilling to use online.
• Anima should be simpler to use for patients.  It is better for staff as it codes cases Red, Amber & Green and it links to Systmonline whereas Doctrin doesn’t, so it saves staff time.
• Anima opening times will be the same as Doctrin - 8-11.00 Mon-Fri.  Staff can reset capacity daily according to resources. Prescriptions will still be ordered through Systmonline or the NHS app.

Funds from previous PPG (2019)

• Sarah is in contact with Barclays to release the frozen account

Website and noticeboard updates 

• Caroline Freeman is the Lakeside Communications Officer responsible for updating the website.  It was noted that GP names are now out of date.
• Post meeting note:  Website has now been updated.
• The PPG wish to update their section on the LS website to encourage more patients to participate.
• The PPG would also like to have notice boards in each surgery.  Lindsay will look into this.
• It was noted that there are a lot of notices around the Cedar House surgery.

Frequency of future meetings

• Agreed bi-monthly. Next date Monday 11 March 2024