About the Patient Participation Group

A PPG is a group of patient interested in health and healthcare issues, who want to get involved with and support the running of their practice.

The aim of The Wells Medical Practice PPG is to give patients at our surgery an opportunity to become actively involved with the doctors and staff in planning and developing new services and to take an active interest in their own healthcare.

Meetings are held remotely on a bi-monthly basis.

Interested in joining?

If you’re interested please complete the following form.

Join the PPG

The information you supply us will be used lawfully, in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018. The Data Protection Act 2018 gives you the right to know what information is held about you and sets out rules to make sure that this information is handled properly.

Minutes of The Wells Medical Practice (TWMP) PPG Committee Meeting

To request minutes of previous meetings, please contact the practice

Date:

  • 1st April 2025 at 12.30pm via Teams

Present:

Practice members:

  • Elle Clarke (EC) (Office Manager)
  • Dr Helen Creed (HC) (GP)
  • Louise Handford (LH)

Patient members:

  • Deana Leadbeter (DL)
  • Roderic Macmillan (RM)
  • Mike Tyrer (MT)
  • Lucinda Curtis (LC)
  • David Kirkham (DK) (Chair)
  • Diane Morgan (DM)
  • George Skomorowski (GS)
  • Elaine Lowe (EL)
  • Nancy Stone (NS)

Apologies:

  • Pam Royal (PR)
  • Lucy Frost (LF)
  • Doreen Williams (DW)
  • Harriet Clare, (HC)
  • Dr Rachel Myers-Lamptey (RML) (GP)
 

Survey

The group discussed feedback from the previous patient survey, including a question regarding updates to the Anima system and how the practice’s performance compares with others in the area. LH will look into this. It was also discussed how the survey feedback is being implemented within the surgery and plans for further improvements. MT raised concerns about the functionality of the Anima system’s cursor.

 

Patient Newsletter

Following the survey, it was discussed how best to share updates with patients. It was agreed that a quarterly newsletter would be best. Concerns were raised about how to inform patients of this newsletter without overusing SMS messages. While prompting on Anima could be done, it would still be necessary to send ad-hoc SMS messages to promote the newsletters. However, it was agreed that SMS would be acceptable as only using quarterly for this topic.

All to please email in ideas for the Newsletter and the sub team will construct the draft ahead of sharing with the full team for approval ahead of patient publishing.

 

Action Points

LH is working internally and with Anima to continuously review current working processes. They plan to update both PPG and all patients with ongoing developments. Additionally, we will talk to other local practices about using the same survey to ensure greater shared data. Ben, our ACP, is also completing work on 'Demand and Capacity,' which links to this.

A quarterly newsletter will be created. Mike, Diane, and Deana will form a sub-team to lead this.

The newsletter will include updates on the Anima system, information on the One You service, NHS 111 service, health promotion content , and staff profiles.

 

Next Meeting

3rd June in person at the Practice 12:30pm.

Practice population research

Practice population research by EC (Post Meeting)

  • Practice Population: 19,726
  • Gender: 50% female, 50% male
  • Age:
    • Children and young people (0-17yrs) – 20%
    • Working age adults (18-64yrs) – 64%
    • Older people (65yrs+) – 16%

Number of surveys sent: 413

Appointments / Anima

How did You book Your Appointment?

  • Online/Anima: 62.2%
  • In Person: 17.4%
  • By Phone: 12.1%
  • Other: 8.3%

Ease to book Appointment 

  • 1 Very Dissatisfied: 8 (6.2%)
  • 2: 8 (6.2%)
  • 3: 32 (24.8%)
  • 4: 29 (22.5%)
  • 5 Very Satisfied: 52 (40.3%)

Appointment Times Offered

  • 1 Very Dissatisfied: 10 (11.5%)
  • 2: 6 (6.9%)
  • 3: 24 (27.6%)
  • 4: 12 (13.8%)
  • 5 Very Satisfied: 35 (40.2%)

Experience of Using Anima

  • 1 Very Dissatisfied: 15 (13.9%)
  • 2: 17 (15.7%)
  • 3: 29 (26.9%)
  • 4: 11 (20.%)
  • 5 Very Satisfied: 25 (23.1%)

Patient Comments on Anima

What Patients Like about Anima?

  • Process of booking appointment is very smooth
  • Many patient found the service easy to use and had no problem to access it
  • Practical

What could be improved?

  • Takes a while to set up an Anima account
  • Lengthy questions that ask for irrelevant information
  • Difficult to fill in all the questions in 30 minutes
  • Some patients would still like the option to speak to someone rather than having to use Anima
  • Have all the systems in one place

The GP Surgery Team

How Helpful was the Receptionist Team?

Friendliness/Helpfulness of the reception Team

  • 1 Very Dissatisfied: 7 (6.7%)
  • 2: 3 (2.9%)
  • 3: 8 (7.6%)
  • 4: 20 (19%)
  • 5 Very Satisfied: 67 (63.8%)

Ease at which you got through to reception over the phone?

  • 1 Very Dissatisfied: 10 (11.5%)
  • 2: 6 (6.9%)
  • 3: 24 (27.6%)
  • 4: 12 (13.8%)
  • 5 Very Satisfied: 35 (40.2%)

How Efficient are we at Dealing with your Requests?

  • Very Dissatisfied: 6.7%
  • Slightly Dissatisfied: 2.9%
  • Neutral: 7.6%
  • Slightly Satisfied: 19.0%
  • Very Satisfied: 63.8%

Respondents that were Satisfied with the Surgery

  • Dissatisfied: 3.1%
  • Neutral: 18.2%
  • Satisfied: 78.7%

Other

Overall Look/Feel of the Practice’s Reception Area?

  • Very Dissatisfied: 2.4%
  • Slightly Dissatisfied: 4.0%
  • Neutral: 12.1%
  • Slightly Satisfied: 31.5%
  • Very Satisfied: 50%