{"id":481891,"date":"2026-03-18T09:10:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T09:10:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/481891\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T09:10:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T09:10:10","slug":"lanchester-medical-surgery-vows-improvement-after-cqc-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/481891\/","title":{"rendered":"Lanchester Medical Surgery vows ‘improvement’ after CQC report"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Lanchester Medical Centre was placed in special measures after an inspection by the Care Quality Commission<\/a> (CQC) on July 31, 2025.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n Inspectors found \u201cserious leadership failings that jeopardised people\u2019s safety\u201d at the site, which is run by Dr Harpreet Singh Kalra and provides services to around 4,100 people.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n Now, Dr Kalra has vowed to provide a better service to patients.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n Dr Harpreet Singh Kalra (Image: The Northern Echo)\n<\/p>\n

\n In a statement to members of Durham County Council\u2019s health committee, he said: \u201cIt\u2019s been extremely hard since this report came to us in July. It\u2019s been a learning curve for me and the team. It has been very unfortunate that we have had to go through this journey, but at the end of the day, we have tried our very best.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n However, patients and families connected to the surgery continue to raise concerns with the service provided.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n Durham county councillor Alison Gray, of Lanchester ward, read out a statement on behalf of a person about the practice.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n It read: \u201cWe are in the middle of a formal complaint about Lanchester Medical Centre. This has been ongoing for 11 weeks with no response to date.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe complaint concerns: repeated misdiagnosis; repeated prescription of potentially dangerous medication; refusal to issue advised medication; poor record keeping; lack of basic medical care; repeated maladministration with communications from other health providers; inadequate procedures and dealing with referrals to hospital; totally inadequate implementation of procedures to dealing with complaints; and ineffective management resulting in a lack of duty of care.\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cIn my constituents’ view, the developments since the inspection have been negative and have added even more distress to the family.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Dr Kalra was prevented from operating following the inspection and South Durham CIC was subcontracted to manage the centre. He returned in January.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n In its findings, the CQC said medicines and treatments were not always safe and the service did not always manage the risk of infection to prevent illnesses from spreading.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n It added that the repeat prescriptions process was also failing and people were at risk of harm as they could miss important follow-up care due to results not being managed properly.\n<\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n Stephen Bowron, Reform councillor for Chilton, said the findings were \u201calarming\u201d, adding: \u201cIt\u2019s like going back to the 1970s.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Asked whether the practice is now fit for purpose, Dr Kalra said: \u201cMy main aim is to ensure this practice can go from special measures to outstanding. I know that is a big step, but we are going to aim for that, and whatever it takes, I am going to do it.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n Staff now attend monthly meetings with the CQC to track the progress of an improvement plan put in place following the assessment.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cIt will take a bit of time, but we are in a positive direction and, with the support of the Integrated Care Board and our own team, we are getting where we need to be,\u201d Dr Kalra added.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n The regulator visited the County Durham practice in 2025 after whistleblowers and patients raised concerns.\u00a0\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n Inspectors found it didn\u2019t have enough qualified, skilled and experienced staff, didn\u2019t control the risk of infection, and didn\u2019t have effective systems in place to investigate complaints.\n<\/p>\n

\n The report detailed how leaders also didn\u2019t consider the well-being of staff and they were afraid to raise concerns about people\u2019s safety. This led to a \u201ctoxic culture\u201d, with some staff saying they had experienced bullying and others saying they had been threatened when they tried to speak up.\n<\/p>\n

\n Dr Kalra said improving staff relations and team morale was a priority upon his return. He told the committee: \u201cWe need to ensure our staff and team work well. We need to ensure our team is united, and everyone is listened to.\u201d\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n Several public meetings have taken place since the report was published, organised by county councillor Alison Gray, along with a patient participation group. The November meetings resolved that patients had ‘no confidence’ in the surgery’s leadership.\n<\/p>\n

\n Luke Akehurst, Labour MP for North Durham, also backed the calls. Speaking in January, he said: \u201cI believe Lanchester Medical Centre patients have been badly let down and deserve a new GP who will provide the high-quality service every NHS patient deserves.\u201d\n<\/p>\n

\n But Dr Kalra said he visited several other practices to learn how to improve his leadership during his time away from Lanchester Medical Practice.\n<\/p>\n

\n He added: \u201cWe always aim for excellence, and that is what we want to do. There have been many mistakes by me; there is a lot of learning that I have been doing. If we don\u2019t work as a team, we won’t be able to achieve this.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\n \u201cWe are going in a positive direction.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lanchester Medical Centre was placed in special measures after an inspection by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":481892,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[102,2960,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-481891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481891","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=481891"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/481891\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/481892"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=481891"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=481891"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=481891"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}