Enhancing patient safety and strengthening clinical governance have been the main focus of Doctor Care Anywhere’s action plan following the virtual GP provider’s downgrading by The Care Quality Commission (CQC).
And Health & Protection can report that the plan has involved reviewing and updating clinical policies and procedures, investing in staff training and development, and implementing new systems for monitoring and auditing of services.
Last week, Doctor Care Anywhere confirmed it had completed its action plan to reverse the downgrade it received from the CQC last year, and was looking forward to a reinspection.
Almost a year ago, Health & Protection reported that the CQC downgraded its rating for the virtual GP provider, which offers services for Axa Health’s private medical insurance (PMI) customers, to requires improvement.
The regulator downgraded Doctor Care Anywhere in the areas of being safe and being well-led.
CQC under fire
But over the summer, the CQC itself was told to make “radical” improvements to its performance after an independent review led by Dr Penny Dash uncovered “significant” internal failings hampering its ability to identify poor performance at hospitals, care homes and GP practices.
And this week the CQC came under even more fire from both its own review and the final version of the Dash report.
The CQC-commissioned report by Professor Sir Mike Richards said that the transformation programme that was initiated by CQC in 2021 had failed in all three of its three main initiatives.
Also this week, The Telegraph reported that the CQC is stop its assessments for six months, in order to focus on its backlog of hospital and care home inspections.
Specific improvements
In light of this week’s events, Health & Protection asked Doctor Care Anywhere what specific improvements it made in its action plan.
Doctor Care Anywhere said in a statement: “Following the CQC findings from our July 2023 inspection, Doctor Care Anywhere implemented a comprehensive action plan earlier this year to address the areas identified for improvement.
“Our focus has been on enhancing patient safety, strengthening clinical governance, and ensuring the highest quality of care.
“The action plan involved reviewing and updating our clinical policies and procedures, investing in staff training and development, and implementing new systems for monitoring and auditing our services.
“For example, we have enhanced our medicines management policies and introduced additional quality assurance processes to ensure best practice is consistently followed.
“These improvements have been fully implemented and are now embedded into our daily operations, making our services safer and more effective for our patients.
“Regarding the recent reports about the CQC pausing inspections, while we understand the situation, we remain committed to continuous improvement and compliance.
“We are confident in the steps we’ve taken and look forward to demonstrating the positive impact of our actions when inspections resume.”
Changes made to reflect CQC feedback
For their part, Axa Health confirmed that Doctor Care Anywhere had made changes to reflect feedback from the CQC which resulted in its downgrading.
It issued a statement in response to Health & Protection‘s query asking it how frustrated it was that their virtual GP provider cannot demonstrate improvements made to the CQC and how confident they were that Doctor Care Anywhere had made these improvements and will be able to demonstrate them.
It said: “It is critical for patients to have effective regulators for healthcare and we welcome CQC inspections for all our providers.
“We are always supportive of any measures which will improve patient safety and the quality of care for all patients.
“Doctor Care Anywhere has put in place changes to their policies and procedures to reflect the feedback from the CQC.”
Speedier service
Axa Health’s CEO, Heather Smith, raised the importance and benefits of digital services at an Association of British Insurers’ (ABI) event earlier this week, citing the example of dermatological solutions.
Participating in a panel session, Smith explained that while patients would expect faster treatment when they go private, digital services were speeding up that process even further.
“So where they were taking two weeks to find an appointment, see a consultant, they can now get to a diagnosis in a matter of days,” Smith said.
“And sometimes you can see a dermatologist the same day because with an additional service you’re able to speak to a dermatologist in Newcastle even if you’re in Exeter.
“And that just reduces the travel and time and cost.”