Wellness @The Clinic

This service is rated as Good overall.

Following our inspection on 5 July 2023 the key questions are rated as:

Are services safe? – Good

Are services effective? – Good

Are services caring? – Good

Are services responsive? – Good

Are services well-led? – Good

We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at Wellness @The Clinic as part of our inspection programme, and to provide the service with a rating.

This service is registered with CQC under the Health and Social Care Act 2008 in respect of some, but not all, of the services it provides. There are some exemptions from regulation by CQC which relate to particular types of regulated activities and services and these are set out in Schedule 1 and Schedule 2 of The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014 (HSCA 2014).

Wellness @The Clinic provides a range of services both within and outside the CQC scope of registration. The services within the scope of registration were inspected and these included the intravenous therapies service, where a range of different multi-vitamins infusions were administered, intramuscular injections administered to treat pain and a health condition such as hay fever and the removal of minor skin lesions by cryotherapy.

Services offered outside the scope of registration included types of ‘wellbeing’ holistic therapies, such as acupuncture, massage and beauty treatments. The service also offered ear syringing undertaken by an audiologist and non-therapeutic circumcision to boys under the age of six months, undertaken by a non-clinical practitioner. Both these services are exempt from regulation as they are provided by persons not listed within the HSCA 2014.

Dr Mohammad Y Arshad is a GP and the registered manager for the service. A registered manager is a person who is registered with the Care Quality Commission to manage the service. Like registered providers, they are ‘registered persons’. Registered persons have legal responsibility for meeting the requirements in the Health and Social Care Act 2008 and associated Regulations about how the service is run.

As part of our inspection methodology we request registered service providers to encourage their patients to share feedback directly with CQC. Before this inspection visit we received 18 ‘Feedback On Care’ forms. All these feedback forms provided positive feedback regarding the service they received.

Our key findings were:

• The service provided care and treatment in a way that kept patients safe.

• The service offered a range of different services, many of which were not within the scope of CQC registration. Those services that were within CQC scope were offered on a private, fee-paying basis only and were accessible to patients who chose to use them.

• The provider’s website, https://wellnessattheclinic.com offered comprehensive information about the different types of services they offered and included details of fees for each service. The website was in the process of being updated as the provider no longer offered slimming treatments.

• A comprehensive range of policies and procedures were available and these included safeguarding policies for adults and children, responding to a medical emergency, a recruitment policy and a business continuity policy.

• The service employed a small, stable staff team. Team members spoken with were aware of their own role and responsibilities and told us they felt supported The GPs and other clinicians who worked at the service were appropriately trained for the range of regulated activities offered.

• Patient feedback was actively sought and where issues were identified changes made to improve service quality. The feedback we received directly and seen on the inspection visit was very positive.

• There were systems in place for identifying, acting on and learning from incidents, patient safety alerts and complaints.

• Governance arrangements and quality improvement activity were established and there were plans in place to expand the range of regulated activities to include phlebotomy and private GP services.

The areas where the provider should make improvements are:

• Update, as planned, the service’s website to reflect the current ranges of clinical services offered.

• Facilitate or obtain evidence that nurses are trained to level 3 in safeguarding in accordance with the intercollegiate guidance.

Dr Sean O’Kelly BSc MB ChB MSc DCH FRCA

Chief Inspector of Hospitals and Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services