Statement of Purpose

Service provider details

• Name: Dr Sodhi & Partners
• Address: Hungerford Surgery, The Croft, Hungerford, Berkshire RG17 0HY
• Telephone: 01488 682507
• Email: Please use our secure online form
• Practice manager: Mike Hall
• Provider ID: 1-199754945
• Legal Status: Partnership

Partners

• Dr Navreet Sodhi
• Dr Ellora Evans
• Dr Emma Alcock

Salaried GPs

• Dr Sophie Conroy
• Dr Harriet Plumridge
• Dr Laura Stowe

Location

• Name and Address: Dr Sodhi & Partners, Hungerford Surgery, The Croft, Hungerford, Berkshire RG17 0HY
• Telephone: 01488 682507
• Location ID: 1-537624945
• Registered Manager: Dr Navreet Sodhi

Service types

• Doctors consultation service
• Doctors’ treatment service

Regulated activities

• Diagnostic and screening procedures
• Family planning service
• Maternity and midwifery services
• Surgical procedures
• Treatment of disorder of injury

Service users

Open for registration to patient’s resident and temporarily resident in the practice area 

Our mission statement

The Hungerford Surgery is a well-established General Medical Practice. We strive to work in partnership with our patients to provide the best quality health care in a safe and supportive environment. ‘Modern medicine, traditional values’

Vision

To provide the highest achievable standard of care and treatment by well trained and motivated medical, nursing and multi-disciplinary staff working within local and national regulation, standards and evidencebased guidance.

Core Values

Caring

• To treat all with kindness and empathy
• To respect patient' s dignity and privacy
• To involve patients and their families in decisions about their care and treatment
• To treat all equally and fairly and respect diversity at all times

Safe

• To maintain a safe and health promoting environment
• To assess and respond to needs of our patients
• To provide an appropriate range of high quality and cost-effective services
• To identify the adults and children at risk and protect and support them
• To adequately review and investigate significant events, complaints and feedback

Teamwork

• To have effective and compassionate leadership
• To value the contribution of each team member
• To work in co-operation with other teams
• To build a safe and supportive environment for our staff
• To speak and act truthfully and be accountable for our actions

Learning and improving

• To be a learning organisation and provide learning opportunities for relevant students
• To continuously learn, develop and improve our services

Culture

• To nurture a culture which is open, friendly and forward-looking

Hungerford

Hungerford is an attractive market town situated in an area of outstanding natural beauty in West Berkshire. It benefits from its close association with the Kennet & Avon Canal and has excellent road and rail links. The major towns of Swindon, Newbury, Reading, Oxford, Andover and Salisbury are all within easy reach. A number of residents commute each day to London on the Great Western Railway which runs into Paddington.

The Town is home to many antique shops but is also well served by a couple of supermarkets and cafes which benefit from the patronage of the tourist population. Each year the Town hosts a medieval festival called Hocktide, an arts festival, a carnival and a Christmas Extravaganza!

Practice philosophy

Our philosophy is ‘modern medicine, traditional values’. We are the only doctors’ surgery in Hungerford and consequently feel very much part of the community. Personal lists and a relatively stable population, helps us to get to know our patients as individuals very well. Most of our staff live in the area.

The Partnership is supportive, friendly, open, fair and democratic. All clinicians and the management team meet for coffee every day which provides a forum for informal discussion alongside our weekly practice meetings usually held on Monday lunchtimes.

Practice overview

The Practice covers the whole of Hungerford and the surrounding villages within a five mile radius of the town giving us a practice population of around 7,500. We are a semi-rural practice and our patients come from all social groups with a demographic spread which is close to the national average. The practice is based in Hungerford, West Berkshire and is located 10 miles west of Newbury, 30 miles west of Reading and 20 miles east of Swindon.

The Practice is housed in modern purpose built premises located in the Croft, an historic green. We have a large accessible waiting area for patients with parking at the rear. The surgery has 6 consulting rooms, two fully equipped treatment rooms equipped for minor surgery and a phlebotomy room as well as ample reception and administration facilities. We share the car park with the Community Health Centre which is provided by the Berkshire Healthcare Foundation Trust and houses the District Nursing team and the Health Visiting team, as well as providing other NHS services such as physiotherapy and chiropody.

While we currently run personal lists, we have considerable flexibility allowing for cross-cover and are able to provide our patients with a fast and effective service. Our patient population is generally well informed, with a tendency towards assertiveness, and we are ideally located to offer patient choice in accessing services provided in Newbury (WBCH), Reading (RBH), Swindon (GWH) as well as Basingstoke and Oxford hospitals.

A typical non-duty day involves a morning, starting at 8.00 am, of 15 booked patients and 3 telephone calls. We run 10 minute appointments. Each doctor will have an average of 2 home visits each day. Afternoon surgery normally has 15 booked appointments and 3 telephone calls with an occasional extra at the end if the Duty Doctor has been very busy. The practice closes at 6:30 pm Monday to Friday.

The Surgery also offers additional routine appointments on specific days of the week, and we are participating in the provision of seven-day access and extended working hours for the Newbury and District area. 

Practice team

Our nursing team comprises 4 Practice Nurses and 1 Health Care Assistant. The wider practice team includes a Social Prescriber, a Clinical Pharmacist, Pharmacy Technicians, a Mental Health Practitioner, a Musculoskeletal Physiotherapist (all Primary Care Network roles), Care Navigators, Administrators, a Medical Secretary, a Reception Manager and the Practice Manager and Assistant. Our staff have full knowledge of the services the practice has to offer and are happy to assist with any enquiries.

The GPs and Nursing team together provide the full range of clinics for family planning, childhood immunisation, NHS health checks, travel, minor surgery, minor illness, asthma, COPD, diabetes and hypertension - involving the wider primary health care team as is appropriate. Community midwives provide antenatal and postnatal clinics at the practice. District Nurses are based in the Community Health Centre adjacent to the surgery and we also accommodate a range of visiting clinicians and counsellors in the areas of mental health, alcohol and drugs counselling and the local Citizens Advice Bureau holds outreach sessions here. Out of Hours care is provided by Westcall.

We are all involved in the terminal care of our patients who are supported in their own homes whenever possible, and we look after the majority of patients living in the Hungerford Care Home and other local residential care facilities.

We are well equipped clinically and have diagnostic equipment which includes ECG and portable ECG machines, portable 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitors, spirometry, nebulisers, peak flowmeters, pulse oximeters, obstetric and vascular sonic aids and minor surgery. We are also unique amongst West Berkshire practices in offering patients an anti-coagulation monitoring service through INRStar software. 

Training

We resumed being an accredited Training Practice under Health Education England Thames Valley in October 2022. Our Educational Supervisor for GP Training is Dr Niti Sodhi. We also offer training placements to medical students from Bristol University and Imperial College, London, and student nurses from Oxford Brookes; as well as various clinical and administrative work experience placements. Staff training is facilitated and monitored through the Blue Stream Academy system which provides on-line training modules. In addition various in-house training modules are provided face-to-face and staff attend external training appropriate to their role.

Information technology

We use the TPP SystmOne Clinical System and have a modern and comprehensive IT infrastructure. The majority of correspondence is now electronic which reduces the need to print letters. We offer all patients Choice at Referral, and this is managed using the NHS e-Referral Service (ERS) system. We continue to develop and expand our on-line services, and this will include offering patients’ on-line access to booking appointments, ordering repeat prescriptions and viewing their summary care record.

Quality outcomes framework and enhanced services

Our practice consistently achieves high QoF points every year and in addition we participate in the Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention (QIPP) initiative projects including providing an additional out of hour’s extended Saturday morning clinic. We also consistently achieve significant savings on medicines management and prescribing initiatives.

We undertake a wide range of Enhanced Services including Community Enhanced Services (CES) work which results in excellent multi-disciplinary team care for our patients.

 

Clinical commissioning

We are part of the Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire (BOB) Integrated Care System (ICS) and we are involved in many health-related projects and initiatives.

Primary care network (PCN)

We are a member practice of the West Berkshire Rural PCN along with Lambourn Surgery and Kintbury and Woolton Hill Surgery. PCNs are a key part of the NHS Long Term Plan with general practices being part of a network, typically covering 30,000 to 50,000 patients. Our network aims to provide the structure and funding for services to be developed locally, in response to the needs of the patients we serve.

Services

NHS services provided by our GPs and clinical staff are defined under the General Medical Services Contract. They are mainly split into three groups of Essential, Additional and Enhanced services for people who have health conditions from which they are expected to recover, chronic disease management and general management of terminally ill patients. These services include:

• Routine medical check ups
• Medication reviews
• Repeat prescription service
• Management of Diabetes, Asthma, COPD, Hypertension
• Care planning
• Minor Surgery
• Minor illness
• Phlebotomy
• Anti-coagulation monitoring
• Maternity services – midwife and GP
• Contraception services and pill checks, coil, implanon, insertion and removal
• Weight loss and lifestyle management.
• Treatment of depression and anxiety
• Counselling
• Cervical cytology screening
• Wound Management and suture removal
• Childhood immunisations
• Child health surveillance
• NHS travel advice and vaccination
• Covid-19, influenza and routine adult immunisation
• Smoking cessation advice
• Annual coil checks
• Annual Learning Disability checks
• District Nurse Management
• Home visits
• Palliative Care
• NHS cardiovascular health checks
• Alcohol and drug misuse
• Mental Health
• Spirometry
• ECG
• Foot care

Non-NHS services

We also provide services which are non-NHS and are paid for, as appropriate, by the patient or requesting organisation, including:

• Private medical insurance reports and medicals
• Sports, pre-employment and HGV medicals
• Private appointments and blood tests
• Fitness certificates
• Non-NHS vaccinations

GP and nurse appointments are available to book in advance as well as GP urgent appointments on the day. Home visits are available for patients unable to visit the practice. If the Practice is not able to meet an individual patient need a referral to an appropriate health professional or service will be made. Community Health Services are also available to the patient and may be provided in the patient’s home or from a community location depending on the service.

Health and care needs

We respect the privacy and dignity of our patients and endeavour to treat all patients with respect and honesty:

Access

For patients that do not speak English as a first language a family member can translate at their request, or a translation service is available. We are also able to provide information in larger fonts or electronically as requested. The practice is fully accessible to wheelchair patients and there are disabled toilet and baby changing facilities.

Consent and Chaperone

Consulting rooms are away from the reception area where no conversation can be overheard, or examination seen. No patient is ever examined, or procedure undertaken without consent. A chaperone is available upon request.

Carers

We encourage patients to let us know if they are a carer or are cared for by another person as this helps to alert us to possible needs in this role. A carer is someone who, without payment, provides help and support to a partner, child, relative, friend or neighbour who could not manage without their help. This could be due to age, physical or mental illness, substance misuse or disability. Anyone can become a carer; carers come from all walks of life, all cultures and can be of any age.

Confidentiality and access to patient information

All patient information is confidential, and we comply fully with the Data Protection Act and General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) and are registered with the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) to keep patient data confidential, safe and secure. All employees have access to this information in relation to their role and have signed a confidentiality agreement. Relevant information may be shared within the multidisciplinary health care team at the practice and with other health care professionals to whom a patient is referred. Those individuals have a professional and contractual duty of confidentiality. Confidential and identifiable information relating to patients will not be disclosed to other individuals without their explicit consent, unless ordered to do so by court order or where it is in the public interest to do so to prevent harm.

The Data Protection Act and The Access to Health Records Act allow a patient to find out what information is held in their health records and those of someone who has died in some circumstances. A patient wishing to see health records should make a written request to the Practice.

Comments, suggestions and complaints

We welcome comments and suggestions on our service and have a protocol for dealing with complaints. If it is not possible to resolve the complaint there and then it is forwarded to the Practice Manager, who will ensure all relevant details are recorded, arrange for the complaint to be investigated and respond in a timely manner. If the complaint is not resolved to the satisfaction of the complainant, we offer the services of the patient advocacy service SEAP and / or the patient is referred to the Health Service Ombudsman who can investigate the complaint further. A suggestion box and comments book are available in the main waiting room, and we encourage feedback through the NHS Friends and Family Test or NHS Choices website.

Patient Engagement

We have a pro-active and engaged Patient Participation Group, comprising of seven members, who meet quarterly at the Practice. The group have greatly supported the Practice as well as organising and facilitating projects in the wider community including a cancer care support group which meets monthly.