Watlington & Chalgrove Surgeries

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Watlington and Chalgrove Practice Profile

The Practice covers the communities of Watlington and Chalgrove as well as the approximate area bounded by the smaller villages of Stoke Talmage, Tetsworth, Northend and Ewelme (We do not cover Stadhampton nor Aston Rowant/Kingston Blount). This is primarily a rural area, although Watlington town and Chalgrove village each have around 2,900 residents. The M40 lies within 2 miles of Watlington (which acts as our boundary)so access to London and Birmingham is reasonably easy. This means that some of the residents are commuters.

The current Practice list size is approximately 7600. There are three Partners and five Assistant GPs.  All GPs work between 3 and 8 sessions per week.

Patient List Composition

Sex Age (Years) Totals
00 – 09 10 – 19 20 – 29 30 – 39 40 – 49 50 – 59 60 – 69 70 – 79 80 – 89 90 – 99 100+
Male 349 424 314 375 414 591 500 378 160 21 0 3526
Female 319 394 305 387 443 641 489 394 217 48 1 3638
Totals 668 818 619 762 857 1232 989 772 377 69 1 7164

We are a rural Practice with 95% of our patients being White/British. 5% of our patient list is of mixed race or other ethnic origin.

We have 28 adult patients registered who have learning disabilities, the majority of whom live with their parents or have parents on the Practice list.

We provide medical cover for a 60 bed nursing home. 15 beds are for Intermediate Care patients, staying for a short period only. 20 beds are for patients with severe dementia. Many of the remaining patients have relatives living in the local area. The majority of the staff in the nursing home are registered with the Practice. We have more than 300 patients identified as Carers

The Practice operates from 2 main surgeries, one in Watlington and one in Chalgrove. Organisationally, the Practice is divided geographically into 2 similarly sized units. Approximately half the patients look to Chalgrove for their care and half to Watlington. A close Partnership between all doctors is maintained. Drs. Ding,  Hoy and Esiemokhai currently run the surgery in Watlington while Drs. McManus, Binns, Lyon, Perriam and Tidy run the Chalgrove surgery.  While it is intended that the workload is equal between the two surgery teams, there is more visiting in Watlington and there are more surgery consultations in Chalgrove. All surgeries are by appointment only.

Out-of-Hours cover is provided by the Oxfordshire Out-of-Hours Service. We offer extended hours on some Saturday mornings, 8.00 – 10.50am. These sessions are carried out by the duty GP, in rotation.

Watlington surgery is situated on the edge of Watlington town on Hill Road. It was built in 2003 and is owned by the Partners. We provide accommodation for the District Nurses and Health Visitors in this surgery. Chalgrove surgery was built in 2003 and is situated at the edge of the village, on the High Street.

There is 1 antenatal clinic a week run by the Community Midwife each Friday. The Practice does not offer IUD/Implant fitting.

Our current level of employed staff comprises: 8 GPs, 1 full-time Practice Manager, 13 part-time Receptionists, 2 part-time Secretaries, 4 part-time Practice Nurses, 4 part-time Health Care Assistants, one Pharmacist and one First contact Physiotherapist (currently on maternity leave).

The aim of the Practice is to provide a friendly, caring service to our patients. We make a point of always providing same day appointments for every patient who says that this is urgent and clinically necessary. Any patient who requests this before 10:00 is seen by their own Team (Watlington or Chalgrove), where possible. The team is also responsible for visiting all patients who require this. After this time the duty GP will carry out any necessary visit or arrange to see the patient.

We currently take 6 weeks holiday per calendar year (each Partner within each Team having first choice alternate years in rotation). We also take an average of 5 days study leave per year. Every 3 years 1 Partner has compulsory holiday from 24 December to 2 January inclusive in addition to their regular holiday. All other Partners work over these dates. The Practice policy is usually not to employ locums to cover holiday periods wherever possible.

The Practice has been fully computerised since 1990, using the EMIS system. The 2 Practice sites are linked by a landline and computer systems enabling full access to the computerised records of all patients in both surgeries. This assists us in achieving national and local targets as well as gathering accurate data for audit. Additionally, it has improved our repeat prescribing system and our management of chronic diseases. The appointment system is also completely computerised.

We meet formally with the Primary Health Care Team 4 times per year. This meeting covers liaison between District Nurses, Health Visitors and GPs on a formal basis and provides the opportunity for joint educational work with formal speakers.  The 3 Partners and the Practice Manager have regular Partners’ Meetings two Wednesday mornings out of 3. Once a month on a Monday the GP’s, Practice Nurses and Pharmacists have  a clinical meeting. The Practice Nurses and HCA’s meet every 4/6 weeks  as do the Reception team.

We have a very active Patient Participation Group (PPG) who are very involved in helping the Practice achieve a high standard of service to the Patient Population.

As of Nov 2023