Ridgacre House Surgery Patient Participation Group

Notes of a Meeting held on Monday 9th April 2018

Present: Janet Haines( Chair), Betty Cowley(Secretary), Arthur Haines,(Treasurer) , Anne Moore, Barbara Wilcox, Dr.V. Manley , Julie Chilton (Practice Manager) ,Ian Middlemiss

Item / Note / Action by
1 / Introductions and Apologies.
Apologies from : Linda Toft, Jane Don, Yasmin Meghani,CliffHillder and Maureen Bancroft. Janet welcomed everyone and apologised for the delayed meeting, which was caused by the poor weather conditions.
2 / Notes of the meeting held on 22nd January 2018 were approvoed.
3 / Matters Arising
There were no matters arising.
4. / Items to be raised with the Practice
* A patient reported that when she tried to log onto the surgery system she was not able to. When she visited the surgery to investigate she was told that if the service is not activated for twelve months the patient is logged out.
* The lack of appointments online
* Janet asked about the security of our online records.
5 / Report from GP Practice
*The Practice has not been granted a licence to change the pharmacy to the surgery from Hagley Road .
*The surgery had been exceptionally busy over the winter months and especially through March and April with Doctors off on annual leave or sick therefore there were fewer appointments .Urgent problems will always be seen that day by the Duty Doctor. One day there had been 45 requests to the Duty Doctor.
* Dr. Leung had given birth to twins. Lyn Baines had joined the Reception staff. Harriet Fowler FY.2 at the surgery for 4 months. Bernadette Stevens had joined the secretarial team.
* Julie confirmed that if a patient does not activate their online account for twelve months they are logged out. Dr. Manley was not aware of this. It was decided that a notice be displayed informing patients and if possible the reception staff would also highlight this when patients received their online password.
* Dr. Manley assured the PPG that records remain safe and confidential. There are robust Firewalls. Every Pratice has a guardian in charge of security. Some organisations have access to Data but they have no names. They use the information for analysis. Any new patient can opt out of their Data being used.
Dr. Manley feels the NHS has made everything as safe as possible.
Janet asked what happens if the system goes down? Dr. Manley said that because the surgeries are on different sites they can swap and help each other out.
6 / Chairpersons Report
Janet attended the Primary Care Engagement Forum on the 31st January at Bartholomew House. The Forum looked at a 22 page report. The 3 Commissioning Groups are to merge, Birmingham Cross City, Birmingham South and Solihull - BSOL.
Funding may change.
One of the PPG members asked if, due to the merger, new committee members had been selected. When the Chair confirmed that they had - he registered a formal complaint. There are positions for lay people on such committees, but this information had been ineffectively advertised as at least two people present would like to have been able to apply for selection. The Chair agreed, apologised and said she would take the matter forward.
Janet attended the PPG Chairpersons meeting at Jiggins Lane on the 7th February. Only 6 people attended. Once again the intention was voiced to try to make the representation in the PPG's more diverse. The other PPGs were impressed that Ridgacre Surgery have representatives from the surgery at their meetings.
7 / Development of Leaflet Outlining Role of the PPG
Janet, Arthur, Cliff and Betty had met Duncan Holman at Nechells Surgery on March 9th to discuss designing a leaflet outlining role of PPG and asking people to join. Poppy , a secretary from the Practice had offered to help and joined the meeting.
A lengthy discussion followed and it was decided to put Your Surgery Needs You on the leaflet. Poppy was confident she could design a small leaflet and Poster.Duncan would distribute the leaflets in the local community of Nechells surgery , such as Pharmacies and Mosques.
Julie brought the finished leaflet and Poster to the meeting. It was approved and Janet asked for thanks to be given to Poppy for an excellent result.
8. / Development of PPG group at Nechells Surgery.
The meeting at Nechells also discussed how a group could be developed at Nechells.
The demographic is very different to The Quinton surgery but Duncan felt that the population was more stable than a few years ago, although the population movement was higher than national average. The Quinton PPG said they would help in any way they could to enable a Nechells group to be formed.
9 / Suggestion Box
No suggestions but the surgery reported that Family and Friends comments were very good. Any negative comments were acted upon as quickly as possible. Betty asked how many patients had proved to be a "nuisance". It was reported that approximately 20 zero tolerance letters are sent out each year . There is an emergency button on every computer in the event of a severe problem with a patient.
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10 / Treasurer's Report
Arthur reported that there had been no transactions since the last meeting so the amount in the "kitty" remained at £29.61. He would be putting in a bill for mileage for the Nechells meeting. Only his car was used.
11 / AOB
13 / Date and Time of the Next Meeting
Monday 21st May2018 at the Annexe opposite Main Surgery at 3.00 pm
The meeting closed at 4.40 pm