Lakeside St Neots PPG Meeting Minutes - Monday 25th March 2024

Apologies

• Angela sent apologies due to illness.
• Dr Murphy apologised for the delay in approving the January Minutes.

Matters Arising

Update Re: Extended Access Service

The service is now being provided by Lakeside St Neots for the local PCN which includes St Neots Health Centre, and Gt Staughton surgeries.  The service is provided by in-house and locum GP’s. Dr Murphy, McCarthy and Mountis are all GP Partners and work extra shifts to provide the service as well as Practice Nurse, Nurse Associates and Healthcare Assistants who are employed at Lakeside. The service includes chronic care reviews, (diabetes, blood pressure etc) and smear tests.  It is unable to offer phlebotomy on Saturdays but patients can use the drive through service in Cambridge.

PPG Noticeboards

Sarah will provide a noticeboard in each surgery. Action: PPG to provide content.

PPG Funds

The new Barclays account is in the process of being opened.  Action: Sarah is in contact with the previous signatories to close the existing account.  Action: PPG to agree 2 or 3 new signatories.

Dumbelton Re-opening

Sarah confirmed that the surgery re-opened partially in November 2023 and is now fully open.

Balanced Score Card

February data was discussed but the group were unable to take away the data.

Did Not Attend (DNA’)s have increased to approximately 15 patients a day.  Possible reasons for this were discussed: Questions around how patients are notified of appointments - as in the past, they used to receive text confirmation.  Sue explained that when she opened an Anima case then looked at it later that day, she realised that the case had been closed and an appointment made but she received no notification.  

Action: Sarah to investigate whether a text or email is sent as confirmation of an Anima appointment.

Prebookable 14 day appointments have high DNA’s.  

Action:Dr Murphy to check if the appointment system can issue text confirmations for advance appointments and to include a message about waste of resources for missed appointments.

• The PPG asked if advance appointments could be issued later in the day to avoid the 8.00am rush.
• The practice advised that typically only 10 prebookable appointments are released each day.
• Blood tests and Physio appointments can be booked by phone any time during the day.
• Action: Sarah to get this added to the website.
• Sue said that in order to be able to view blood test results online, a patient has to complete an online form and wait up to 8 weeks.

Anima Update

• 3545 patients have registered so far (263 in the last week).
• Anima is open 7.30-11.00am.  There are 60 Anima appointments available on a Monday and 50 on other days.
• Anima cases coded red must have an appointment within 48 hours.
• The PPG stated that Anima takes even more time than Doctrin to complete and it doesn’t always give suitable options.  There is no free text option as the system has to colour code each case from specific information.
• Jeanette asked why Yaxley Lakeside has Anima open from 8.00am-6.00pm daily.  Dr Murphy explained that Yaxley work to a different system with doctors triaging up to 90 contacts a day.
• Clare stated that the Anima system is an issue for patients who work fulltime as they have to set aside time for callbacks or possible appointment.

Patient Surveys

• The Lakeside patient survey closes on 31 March.
• The practice doesn’t know how many patients have been contacted for the NHS survey this year.

Lakeside Staff Changes

• The PPG were disappointed not to have been notified when Lindsay left in January.  This caused additional delays for the approval of the January minutes.
• Sally Hanson is Lindsay’s replacement, but Sarah will be the main PPG contact now.
• New practitioner staff are: Salaried GP Dr Ismail (Male), GP Registrars Dr Memon (Male) Dr Shah (Female), Heathcare Assistant Keisha.
• There are current vacancies for admin/reception staff.

Lakeside Website

• Jonathan explained that the PPG have been comparing the Yaxley website with the St Neots one and have found that Yaxley’s is more patient focussed in regard to content and wording.
• Dr Murphy explained that all the Lakeside websites are being reviewed therefore the PPG findings will be useful.  Action:Jonathan to forward suggestions to the practice.

Pharmacy First Service

• Jeanette recently attended a Patients Assoc webinar on this new service.  
• Dr Murphy confirmed that the service is being included in the triage of cases.  However not all pharmacies are able to offer all the services and patients sometimes have to come back to the practice.
• It was agreed that the details of this service should be included on the Lakeside website as patients can choose to go to a pharmacy without the need to be referred.

AOB

• The PPG noted that there are occasions when all Anima appointments have gone by 8.00am. Patients are notified by a strap line at the top of the Anima page.
• The phone system does now include a recorded message once all appointments have gone to save patients from holding on unnecessarily.
• For urgent cases when there are no appointments left, patients should call 111 (8 appointments a day are reserved), or attend A & E.
• The new elderly care home in St Neots at Henbrook will register all their patients with Lakeside.
• Dr Murphy explained that they had successfully applied for a small fund of money which will be used to provide an IT kiosk in St Neots Library so that patients with mental health issues can access IT for talking therapy (aimed at those without suitable devices at home).  

Clare Hall on behalf of St Neots U3a invited Dr Murphy to attend a U3a monthly meeting to meet some patients. Dates as follows (all from 2.00-4.00pm):

The Great Hall, The Priory Centre:

• 21st May
• 18th June
• 16th July

The Eatons:

•  20th August
• 17th September [u3a AGM]
• 15th October
• 19th November

Next Meeting

• Next meeting date: Monday 3rd June at 6.00pm 2024 at Eaton Socon.