Practice Showcase

Please see below for quarterly updates from Wordsley Green Surgery:

Vazkepa project

Vazkepa is the latest medication and highly purified omega-3 for patients with heart disease, strokes and vascular disease. The trial data showed substantial benefit to death rates and heart attack rates for patients on the best care we provide at present. The Black Country ICB have recognised this placed it a GP drug to initiate.

With this we provided a review to ensure all our eligible patients were offered this medication. We are now the leading practice in the Black Country for prescribing this medication.

We hope with this review and onward work to stay up to date we can provide our patients the best care within the NHS.

Inclisiran Project

Inclisiran is a 6 monthly injectable medication, licensed for patients with heart disease, stroke and vascular disease. The trial data showed this drug was able to reduce LDL-c Cholesterol by at least 50%.

For patients with such backgrounds, LDL-c cholesterol should be under 1.8 as per England targets. We recognised this early into the medications launch to primary care and in 2022 we review our whole register for eligible patients. We reviewed all our patients on the register to aim for this target cholesterol this was prior to England providing an update to GP targets.

We are the most prescribed for this medication within Dudley as of 2024. We hope this may lead to better quality of life and life expectancy for our patients.

Social Media

We recognise a shift in communication and informing our patients and neighbourhoods of our activity. As a surgery we have made Facebook and Instagram pages to provide patients information and updates.

With this our GPs are developing videos to explain common problems.

Kidney Failure Risk Equation

Kidney Failure Risk Equation or KFRE is a tool recognised by the NHS to calculate the risk of kidney failure and identify high risk patients with kidney problems.

We have run 2 audits on 2022 and 2023 years. In these audits we have identified patients who are deemed high risk and invited for consultation for our team to explain the patients risk and medication or measures to reduce that risk.

This has been highly successful to bring patients back in to the kidney specialist clinic but also provide patients care with medication above and beyond current care.

Recognising this early leads to significant benefit in deaths and dialysis.

Steroid Card audit

Patients may be prescribed steroids as tablet, inhaler, creams etc. These steroids if taken repeatedly or long term can affect how the body deals with stressful circumstances. We have reviewed our patients who meet eligibility to hold a steroid card. We informed and/or provided the patients with steroid cards.

Steroid cards are needed for the patient to show healthcare professionals who may not have full access to their notes, such as A&E doctors or 111.

Cancer audit

We strive for cancers to be diagnosed rapidly in the GP surgery and to avoid diagnoses via A&E routes.

We have recently up taken an audit of all our new cancer diagnoses in the last 12 months to review patients who were diagnosed and how. The review was positive of our care provided and provided useful information on patients diagnosed outside of our surgery

High Blood Pressure finding clinic

A key project is CV prevent. To avoid early heart disease and strokes. In order to do this we set out for patients 45 or older to have blood pressure screening performed. We have used various text message campaigns and signposting to increase uptake of this.

We have a blood pressure machine free for use for the public beside our reception for patients and we are working with local chemists for blood pressure screening projects.

Teratogenic drugs

Part of prescribing we often give medication short term and long term to patients of childbearing age. We have reviewed all patients currently prescribed such medication to ensure they are fully aware of risks of these medications if they were to become pregnant. We have additionally placed warning on their medications to act as a reminder.

Vaccinations

We provide all children with an offer for vaccination working with the health visitor team. We strive to aim for above 95% vaccination rate. We try to provide patients repeat opportunity to re-book their child’s vaccine and counselling over the reasons why the NHS recommends certain vaccines.

Dr Mavi provides a catch up patients who have been struggling to book in so they have access for this vital service.

SGLT2i project in diabetes

In 2024, we have completed a review to optomise our patients care with diabetes. SGLT2i are medications ending in –gliflozin. England guidelines NG28 as of 2024, recommend patients are offered SGLT2i for type 2 diabetes if the patient has high risk of heart disease or stroke, kidney disease, known heart disease or heart failure.

The reason for this even in patients with controlled sugar levels was the risk reduction of heart disease, strokes and cardiovascular death data.

We recognised though we have avidly been reviewing patient there was more work to be done and provide this additional medication where appropriate. We reviewed all patients eligible in this criteria and offered this medication.

SGLT2i project in heart failure

In 2023, we have completed a review to optomise our patients care with heart failure. SGLT2i are medications ending in –gliflozin. These medications in specific drug trials showed large benefits in heart failure related hospital attendances and death.

We reviewed our heart failure list register and provided this medication on top the standard of care where appropriate. We saw a good uptake from our patients.

We hope this will help our patients have better quality of life.

Online Access

We recognise demand for appointment can be highly variable based on season, in outbreaks or other reasons. Patient satisfaction and access to GP services is paramount for us.

We provide online access for patients to register their health problem or query via our online portal – link is below.

This can be used for patients who would like to discuss their problem online, if they do not feel they need a face to face appointment, general queries, request for test or if they cannot get an appointment on the day via the telephone line.

Patient who cannot gain appointments will be directed to our online portal. From here their entry will be triaged by a duty GP. The GP will provide their medical opinion, provide on the day appointments and provide routine care.

The portal is open for submission between 8am and 10am, to allow patients who cannot gain an appointment when calling in the morning to submit their request online. Once a problem has been submitted the portal will be open for that patient to reply to.