Improving our Services

We have been listening and responding to patient feedback to see how we can improve our services at Compass House and have shared below a few recent improvements.

Nurse telephone appointments

Following a suggestion from one of our patients we are trialling some nurse telephone appointments.

These are for general routine enquires such as advice on inhaler usage, dressings, long term treatments, advice on chronic disease management, travel and immunisations. Some telephone appointments are available each day and they can be booked in advance both online and through reception.

So far the feedback has been positive and they seem to be working well. We are monitoring these appointments to check they are helping improve services for our patients so please get in touch with any feedback.

Galmpton Practice

As we grow our team we are reviewing the way we operate to respond to patient feedback. With a bigger team we are looking at how we can offer more appointments at our Galmpton practice. This year we have already had a series of mini-flu clinics at Galmpton in the afternoon and we have also scheduled in more phlebotomy, GP and Advanced Nurse Practitioner time at Galmpton.

Additional Pre-Bookable Appointments

We offer the majority of our GP and Advanced Nurse Practitioner (ANP) appointments on the day as we find that those booked in advance have a high rate of non-attendance (Does Not Attend – DNAs) or they don’t actually need to see a GP at all. This reduces backlog and ensures that patients can receive the care they need in a timely manner, as well as allowing us to be responsive to on-the day emergencies.

Our on the day system does create more capacity and allows us to see a greater number of patients than having pre-bookable appointments. We do offer a limited number of pre-bookable appointments but these go very quickly and are in high demand and we are often asked to provide more of these types of appointments. In response to this feedback we have been trialling adding in some additional pre-bookable appointments for patients at both Brixham and Galmpton. These are pre-bookable up to 2 weeks in advance, both online and via the telephone and we will review the DNA rates and appropriateness in January to see if we extend the trial further.