Practice Plus Group Surgical Centre Portsmouth

On this page

• Overview
• Kindness, compassion and dignity
• Treating people as individuals
• Independence, choice and control
• Responding to people’s immediate needs
• Workforce wellbeing and enablement

Our rating of caring stayed the same. We rated it as good.

This service scored 75 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

Staff treated patients with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity. We reviewed patient comment cards which confirmed that staff treated them well and with kindness. Patients we spoke with described staff as welcoming and friendly. All patients we had conversations with told us all staff were caring and kind. Patients spoke positively about the care and treatment they received from all staff. One of the patients commented, ‘Right from the first appointment to my discharge I had politeness, explaining, advice and very good workmanship.’ Another comment read, ‘I can't pick out one individual it was the whole team they were all friendly and very helpful’. We reviewed the Friends and Family Test dashboard for the month of September 2024 for Portsmouth which showed that 94.4% of patients reported having a positive experience.

We could not collect sufficient evidence to score this evidence category.

We observed staff being compassionate and caring. Staff provided emotional support to patients to minimise their distress. Staff ensured that patients privacy and dignity was maintained when providing care and treatment. There were quiet areas where patients could go if they needed privacy. Conversations with patients were held in areas where they could not be overheard. We observed staff taking time speaking with patients and their family members. Staff offered reassurance during their care and treatment. Patients and their family members were encouraged to ask questions and offered explanations as to the treatment options available to patients.

The service took account of their individual needs. Feedback from patients and families was positive about the care they had received. Patients told us they had been provided information about their procedures at preadmission assessment appointments and that full information and explanations were given pre and post procedure/ surgery. Patients commented that the service met their expectations and were “quick and thorough to get the correct fix”. Another commented that the staff were friendly and put them immediately at ease. They felt their history had been properly read understood.

Clinical leads attended the weekly booking meetings and shared this information with the rest of the staff. Staff said this information was useful as it helped staff move patients who required additional support and gave them the opportunity to look ahead for any issues. Staff told us patients with additional needs were normally picked up via the referral form and discussed during weekly meetings.

Staff involved patients and those close to them in decisions about their care and treatment. Staff communicated with patients and their relatives and provided information in a way that they could understand.

Patients told us they felt well informed about their procedures and care. Staff supported patients to make informed decisions about their care and treatment. They followed guidance to gain their consent written and verbally. A patient commented ‘My consultant explained clearly where the damage was, what my options are, surgical or injections and any risks involved.’ Another comment stated that ‘the consultant was very thorough & fully explained all my treatment options’. Patients were able to make individual choices about their preferred date of surgery and spoke favourably about short waits for surgery. Staff supported and involved patients, families and carers to understand their condition and make decisions about their care and treatment. Feedback from patients and families was positive about the care they had received.

Staff commented on the quick turnaround and gave examples of fitting urgent referrals in the list when they identified gaps. Staff told us that NHS patients didn’t have to wait long for appointments and the private patients did not have a wait list.

The service provided elective surgery to NHS patients within the specialities of orthopaedics, general surgery, eye surgery and endoscopy. Admission to the treatment centre for surgery followed strict referral criteria for people aged 16 and above who required routine non-urgent surgery. Surgical lists ran over five days with theatres operating Monday to Friday. Patients had choices over the date of surgery to best suit their needs. Patients could contact a helpline after they were discharged from the centre for support and advice. This was available 24 hours a day and seven days a week.

The service listened and understood people’s needs. A patient commented ‘After a week of very painful nights, the doctor was patient and provided much needed pain killers’. Feedback posters were displayed around the department in different languages. Patients commented on the fast service and how they were seen quite quickly and did not have to wait long. They further commented how the processes were well explained and quickly executed. Another patient commented that ‘Appointment time was prompt and at every stage the information was very clear’. Feedback reviewed via the friends and family test was positive with patient commenting that from reception, nurses, surgeon and follow on care...all were professional, knowledgeable, patient and caring.

The staff were focused on the needs of patients receiving care. The service had an open culture where patients, their families and staff could raise concerns without fear. Services were flexible to accommodate patients individual needs, there were good examples of staff adapting procedures to meet the needs of patients with specific needs. Staff shared a story of an autistic patient who was accompanied by her mother, the patient was identified during pre-assessment and all staff were aware beforehand. The patient was discussed in pre team brief and brought straight into the theatre. The mother was allowed into theatre in scrubs and recovery nurses were prepped beforehand. By doing so the service listened to and understood the patients’ needs and received very positive feedback from the family. Staff could access interpretation service for patients who needed this.

We did not look at Workforce wellbeing and enablement during this assessment. The score for this quality statement is based on the previous rating for Caring.