Background to this inspection
Updated 31 January 2023
London Aesthetic Medicine (LAM) is a private doctor and consultation service. Dr Uliana Gout provides consultation, examination and treatments in aesthetic medicine and treatment of skin diseases and disorders to adults and children aged 13-17 at 4 Harley Street, London W1G 9PB. The provider informed us that the service does not treat young people under the age of 16. The service provides a broad range of aesthetic services that are not regulated by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), but some services that are, including diagnosis and treatment of skin conditions.
The service is located on the first floor and has two treatment rooms. Services are available to any fee-paying patient. The service is open between 9am and 7pm Monday to Wednesday and between 9am and 5pm Thursday and Friday. The service is not open at the weekend. Services are available to people on a pre-bookable appointment basis. The service director is a registered doctor. An aesthetic therapist works at the service. Support with the management of the service is provided by a clinic coordinator and a service manager and one front of house receptionist, who oversee appointments and administration for service users.
The location is registered with the CQC to provide the following regulated activities; treatment of disease, disorder or injury and diagnostic and screening procedures, minor surgery and diagnosis and screening procedures. At this inspection, the service was not providing any minor surgery but planned to contract a private dermatologist in 2023, to undertake minor surgery procedures, under a practising privileges arrangement.
The service website is https://www.london-aesthetic-medicine.com.
How we inspected this service
Throughout the pandemic CQC has continued to regulate and respond to risk. However, taking into account the circ*mstances arising as a result of the pandemic, and in order to reduce risk, we have conducted our inspections differently.
This inspection was carried out in a way which enabled us to spend a minimum amount of time on site. This was with consent from the provider and in line with all data protection and information governance requirements.
We carried out an announced comprehensive inspection at London Aesthetic Medicine on 12 December 2022. Our inspection team was led by a CQC Lead Inspector. At the time of our inspection the provider was ill and not well enough to attend on site. Our GP Specialist Advisor did not attend on site but had a remote interview with the doctor on 23 December 2022. Before visiting, we looked at a range of information that we hold about the service. We reviewed information submitted by the service in response to our provider information request. During our visit we interviewed staff, observed practice and reviewed documents.
To get to the heart of patients’ experiences of care and treatment, we always ask the following five questions:
- Is it safe?
- Is it effective?
- Is it caring?
- Is it responsive to people’s needs?
- Is it well-led?
These questions therefore formed the framework for the areas we looked at during the inspection.
Overall inspection
Good
Updated 31 January 2023
This service is rated as Good overall.
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 London Aesthetic Medicine as part of our inspection programme of a new provider registration for the service. This was a first rated inspection for the service that was registered with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in November 2021. During this inspection we inspected the safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led key questions.
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.
London Aesthetic Medicine provides a range of non-surgical cosmetic interventions, for example dermal fillers, lip fillers and Botox injections which are not within the CQC scope of registration. Therefore, we did not inspect or report on these services.
The Clinic Coordinator is the registered manager. 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.
Our key findings were:
- The premises were clean and well maintained. There were effective systems in place to reduce the risk and spread of infection.
- There was evidence that safety risks were assessed and well-managed; the service had established an effective system of health and safety checks.
- The service had developed comprehensive policies which staff had reviewed to ensure the information was up to date and relevant.
- There were safe procedures for managing medical emergencies including access to emergency medicines and equipment.
- The service routinely reviewed the effectiveness and appropriateness of the care it provided. It ensured that care and treatment was delivered according to evidence based guidelines.
- There was evidence of activity which aimed to improve the quality of clinical procedures provided.
- Staff involved and treated patients with compassion, kindness, dignity and respect.
- There was evidence of systems to support good governance and management.
The areas where the provider should make improvements are:
- Make access information available for patients on the service website.
- Continue to implement a rolling programme of clinical audit to monitor quality and identify areas for improvement.
Dr Sean O’Kelly BSc MB ChB MSc DCH FRCA
Chief Inspector of Hospitals and Interim Chief Inspector of Primary Medical Services
