BREAKING NEWS Newsletter Edition 9 The Beacon Health Group Newsletter Edition 9 BREAKING NEWS The Beacon Health Group are delighted to inform our patients we have been awarded the new Beaulieu Park Primary Care Development! Building works will start December 2017/January 2018, with the hope to occupy the premises December 2018. These dates are subject to change, but as soon as we have any more information available we will keep our patients at both sites updated.

The Beacon Health Group had our first full CQC inspection on Tuesday 26th September. CQC external regulators visited both Danbury and Mountbatten House and spoke to many of our patients and staff. We would like to express our thanks all those that gave up their time to spend with the CQC inspectors to share their experiences of the care provided at The Beacon Health Group. The day was very intense for all our staff, however, we rose to the occasion admirably. The CQC have given initial feedback, much of which was hugely positive. As always they also raised points where improvements can be made. We await our full formal report and will share with you when we receive this.

SATURDAY FLU CLINIC WILL BE HELD AT Danbury Medical Centre on Saturday 7th October 08:00am – 15.30pm We also have clinics to be booked running during the week at: Danbury Medical Centre on Monday 9th October 18:00pm – 19.45pm Mountbatten House Surgery on Tuesday 10th October 08.30am – 10.30am Danbury Medical Centre on Monday 16th October 08:30am – 12.30pm & 13.30pm – 15.30pm. PLEASE BOOK YOUR APPOINTMENT AT RECEPTION

Comments & Suggestions We would like to thank the help of Debbie from our PIG and Danbury Pre School who helped us purchase the play equipment for the children at The Beacon Health Group, they have gone down wonderfully with our littler patients. Wheelchairs are available for patients at both sites who wish to use them whilst in the surgeries, please do ask at reception should you require one. We would like to remind patients if you would like to have a discussion with our receptionist in private, please let them know and you will be taken to a room outside of the waiting area.

Comments & Suggestions Please be aware the Mission have authorised Beacon Health Group patients to use their additional parking available within their car park. To access this please drive into the Mission’s grounds and proceed around to their parking area opposite Danbury Medical Centre. We would like to inform patients if one of our clinicians is running late our receptionists display signs on the front desk notifying patients of the delay. Thank you for the suggestion of having plants in our waiting area, unfortunately we are unable to accommodate this due to infection control. We have had a few requests over the months to install water coolers in our waiting rooms. As you may have noticed we now have water stations in our waiting area upstairs and downstairs at Danbury Medical Centre. At Mountbatten we have water available at reception, please ask a member of staff.

Hospital correspondence Message from Dispensary If you are given any letters or paperwork from a hospital visit, please let us have a copy so we can add it to your records. Although the normal procedure would be for us to be copied in on correspondence from the hospital, it may take a while before we receive it. If you are given any forms or questionnaires by your GP to complete and return, please ensure you put your name and DOB on it before returning it so that we can match it to your records. Public Health England announcement: Please be aware that there is a shortage of hepatitis B vaccines.

DNA’S The Beacon Health Group have sadly once again had an alarming number of DNA’s reported for the month of September 2017. A total of 317 patients did not attend their appointments in September; 171 at Danbury Medical Centre and 146 at Mountbatten House Surgery PLEASE remember to cancel an appointment if it is no longer needed to allow other patients the opportunity of filling the appointment. As a reminder, to cancel an appointment please call the surgery and press option 2 to leave your name, date of birth, date and time of appointment. Please DO NOT email reception as although this mailbox is checked daily it is not checked continuously throughout the day.

Patient Participation Group Message from our Patient Participation Group   We hope that you have had an enjoyable Summer with holidays etc. With the children now back at school life is very much back to normal. It seems that Autumn has now arrived with a vengeance with the nights drawing in very quickly now. The Meeting on “Self Care in the Community” was held on Monday 18th September, with a presentation made by Dr, Liz Towers of the Whitley House Surgery and is the Clinical Lead with the Mid Essex CCG for Macmillan and Cancer. I was disappointed not to see more patients at this meeting since there are many changes in the way that our healthcare is being managed today. We are all living much longer and the way care is given is much more diverse and it is not always a doctor who overlooks our care, there are specialists at the surgery who look after the specific needs that some of us require. The noticeboards have been thinned out and hope that they will now look fresher and hopefully more readable. I have been thinking about subject matter for our next Information meeting. There are many changes happening in the way our Healthcare is managed so it will be along the lines of “How to get the best out of your GP Surgery” Please let us have any thoughts you may have for forthcoming Information meetings. Paul Foulger Chair Beacon Health Patient Participation Group 26th September 2017