Elm Lodge Surgery
Patient Participation Group
Patient Group Minutes
Date: Wednesday 12th August 2015
Venue: Conference Room, Elm Lodge Surgery
Attending from the Elm Lodge Surgery Practice:
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Michelle Farrington (MF)
Attending members of the Patient Group;
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Michael Colvin (MC)
Pam Cooper (PM)
Beryl Wardle (BW)
Anne Gowers
Robert Skelly (RS)
Barbara Hendrie (BH)
Dorothy Smith (DS)
Apologies
 Hasna Begum (HB)
 Ann Rao (AR)
Minutes
University of the Third Age (U3A):
U3A is an organisation that has been running for many years and is here in our local area
offering a large number of courses and activities for the retired or semi-retired. There is a
membership fee of £25. MC is a member and has had attended several classes/events –
Theatre Group, Computer Classes, Walking Group, Local History Group just to name a few.
The group holds monthly meeting detailed below for your interest.
For more information please visit the web site: u3asites.org.uk/Dulwich or call
0843.886.0980 for Membership Enquiries.
Action: Leaflets are available from the surgery and the group will in touch with the surgery
regarding more involvement.
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U3A next meeting date and venue:
Mon Sep 14th Monthly members meeting:
St Barnabas Church
40 Calton Avenue Dulwich,SE21 7DG
Modern Architecture in Dulwich area and Open House opportunities. presented by Ian
McInnes, ( retired Architect) and David Taylor ( retired Town Planner.
Members of Staff Update:
Holly Stirling will start her new role at Elm Lodge Surgery sometime in September, she will
be taking over the role Brenda played. Her role will be to take care of the elderly and carry
out Holistic Health Checks for the over 75 year olds’
Ola Kaminska-Kotlega who some of you may know as she currently works at Four Ways
Pharmacy, has begun her new role at Elm Lodge Surgery – Ola is carrying out Health Checks
for age group 40-75 year olds. NHS England is inviting patients to have the check carried out.
These checks are for prevention of diseases’ and to identify patients’ with possible health
risks in the future.
Action: To invite Holly along to the next meeting to discuss her role
Self Management Courses:
The surgery had an excellent opportunity to host two Self Management Courses here at the
surgery which was very well attended. Those invited to attend the 6 week course were
patients’ with long standing chronic conditions. RS & AG attended this course and found it
informative, inspirational, well presented, however, one of the speakers was difficult to
understand and the sessions were sometimes too lengthy. RS has continued his new regime
and been asked to join as a volunteer.
Action: To feed back to the Self Management Course these comments.
Making Appointment Protocol:
Issues discussed by the group:
Pharmacy First: For minor/acute illness’ can be dealt with by the local pharmacy, they will
give a brief consultation, the correct medication is recommended. If you eligible for free
prescriptions then you will receive the medication without payment.
Urgent/on the day appointments – Members aired that it is difficult to get through on the
telephone. I agreed the phone lines are very busy, we have 4 telephone lines that are
constantly answered. We also open the doors at 8am and patients are able to book
appointments in person.
For non urgent appointments our diary goes in advance for three weeks
Appointments with the Advance Practitioner are not sought after, however, out Advance
Practitioner is very experienced and highly qualified who can diagnose, prescribe and refer:
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Definition of “The Advance Nurse Practitioner”:
A Nurse Practitioner/Advanced Practice Nurse is a registered nurse who has acquired the
expert knowledge base, complex decision-making skills and clinical competencies for
expanded practice, the characteristics of which are shaped by the context and/or country in
which s/he is credentialed to practice. A master's degree is recommended for entry level.'
The Triage list is open daily.
Definition of Triage medically:
“Decide the order of treatment and decide on the best course of action”
The patient details are collated and placed onto the triage list detailing 1) the problem
2) contact telephone number. A clinician will call as soon as possible and the correct pathway
is discussed and decided upon.
One of those pathways would be an appointment at the Extended Access Centre. An
appointment will be booked by the Surgery and made at a time that is convenient for you.
You will then attend the appointment at the Extended Access Centre, Lister Medical Centre,
101 Peckham Road, SE15 5LJ.
Action: For the Making an Appointment Protocol to be readily available for all patients to
aiding them to utilise the surgery’s system.
Advance Knowledge of GP Timetables:
This issue was raised with special consideration to Dr Kemp who works term time only. At
the surgery we are unable to comment past the three weeks on our diary system as GP’s dates
and availability varies due to other commitments.
Enquiries:
Enquiries are dealt with between 9.30am and 6pm, due to the high demand of phone calls
recieved in the morning and reduced staffing in the evening.
Action: A notice has been displayed within the surgery reiterating this.
Medication Contradictions:
Should you have any questions/queries about the type of medication you are taking or you
have read something of concern on the usage instructions. You should speak to the
pharmacists who are very knowledgeable and happy to discuss medications issues or
alternatively seek the opinion of the GP via a telephone consultation or appointment.
Action: To encourage patients to query anything they are unsure about.
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Hospital Letters:
Hospital letters are received by two methods, via the Postal Service or through the Electronic
Document Transfer directly to the surgery.
These documents are sent through the computer to the designated GP for perusal and
auctioning if necessary, unfortunately, we do send to the named GP on the clinical letter and
you will need to speak to your hospital consultant if the wrong GP is being named on your
documents.
Action: To keep the GPs informed on the treatment of patients.
Are GP’s up to date on the latest treatments on offer:
Treatments that are popular and discussed in the media they are informed on, however, for
specialist departments especially those who are introducing new equipment’s or methods the
GP’s would not be informed as there are too many departments/areas of speciality.
Action: To keep up to date with issues within Primary Care and intrust those in Secondary
Care (Hospital environment) to do the same.
Referrals made to Kings College Hospital but the Appointment was made at Orpington
Hospital:
Notice issued by Kings College Trust
“The Trust provides a wide range of specialist acute and elective inpatient and outpatient
services across a number of hospital and community sites throughout the South East,
including Princess Royal University Hospital, Orpington Hospital, Beckenham Beacon,
Queen Mary's Hospital, Sidcup, and Sevenoaks Hospital”.
MC has had personal experience of using Orpington Hospital and received excellent service
and deliverance. However, many patients are disgruntled with the distance they have to travel
for what they thought was their local hospital.
Action: To inform patients where possible that the appointment will be at a different location
and offer hospital transport where eligible
Integrated Services:
PC has had personal experience of this service and found the nurses from Guys of excellent
standard but was not as satisfied with the level care and professionalism from the carers who
continued their work.
Action: To add this as an agenda item for the next meeting and invite Holly Stirling to the
meeting to discuss her role in Integrated Care.
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South Southwark Patient Participation Group
The group is now being run by Ms Rosemary Watts and the surgery no longer needs to
nominate a representative as more than one PPG member is able to attend the meeting. Please
see capture below:
What are Locality Patient Participation Groups (PPGs)?
There are four Locality Patient Participation Groups (PPGs) in Southwark – Bermondsey
and Rotherhithe, Borough and Walworth as well as Camberwell and Peckham and Dulwich
and Nunhead which meet together as South Southwark Locality PPGs. All members of GP
Patient Participation Groups (PPGs) are welcome to attend the Locality PPGs. Each
Locality Patient Participation Groups also elects two representatives to sit on the
Engagement and Patient Experience Committee.
Can I attend and provide patient feedback?
All patients are very welcome to attend these meetings, for further information contact the
Patient and Public Engagement Team on souccg.southwark-ccg@nhs.net or call 020 7525
7888. The upcoming meetings can be viewed in the NHS Southwark CCG events calendar.
Meeting dates:
Locality
Date
Time
Location
South Southwark
8 September
2015
5.30 - 7.30pm
Cambridge
House, 1
Addington
Square,
Camberwell,
London SE5 0HF
10 November
2015
Action: MF to email Rosemary Watts to get more information about the group and recent
activity.
Art Group Dates:
Forthcoming Dates for the PPG run Art Group are as followed and for general reminder it is
the held on the 1st Friday of every month with the odd exception in the holiday periods.
Friday 4th September 2015 at 2pm
Friday 2nd October 2015 at 2pm
Friday 6th November 2015 at 2pm
Friday 4th December 2015 at 2pm
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Action: MF will notify the reception staffs; however, as this is run by the PPG it is the groups
responsibility to keep patients and members informed.
Next PPG Meeting: Wednesday 11th November 2015 at 2pm
Thank you for your attendance and continued support and input.
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