Aug. 19, 2026

Agenda

The House Partnership PPG - Including HEALTH CHAMPIONS

NOTES OF MEETING HELD ON 19th August 2026 AT 12:30PM

Caterham Valley Medical Practice (CVMP)

Minutes

Apologies:

Tony & Jo Smith

John Woolston

Amy Gabriel

Sally Moore

Jill Staddon

 

 

Moat House GP Partner attending – Dr Anuradha Rajarajan

Greystone House GP Partner attending – Dr Josie Yorke

CVMP GPs attending – Dr P Hamilton & Dr R Wright

This meeting was hosted by Terry Hook from CVMP

 

There were quite a number of attendees to hear a very interesting and informative presentation from Mr Eoin Baldwin who is a Consultant Podiatric Surgeon operating from North Downs Hospital in Caterham. Mr Baldwin has over 37 years of experience in podiatric (foot) surgery and has worked in the NHS at Guy’s and St Thomas’ as well as at St Helier, Carshalton. He is a registered surgical tutor and his work now is substantially private.

 

Mr Baldwin’s talk was illustrated with a number of slides highlighting some common and not so common foot conditions that could be remedied with surgery. We were told that there are over 90 separate bones in the foot which makes it one of the most complicated part of the human body. At the same time Mr Baldwin encouraged audience members to contribute in providing information on their own foot problems with Mr Baldwin offering cogent advice and potential remedies. Some of the slides were for extreme conditions rarely encountered and made interesting viewing. Overall, it was an informative and relevant presentation and the meeting thanked Mr Baldwin for his easy, participitive and approachable manner and his time in attending.  

 

Finance Report.

LAR advised that the current balance stands at £625.75 and stated that £300+ has now been promised as a contribution to a memorial bench in the garden of Greystone House. Dr Josie York further explained that the small memorial garden was to recognise the recent sad death of a valuable member of staff and patients and staff will be able to use the bench.  

Practice Updates

Greystone House Surgery – Dr Josie York, Senior Partner

Dr Josie York reported as follows:-

Jacquie Clayson has recently retired from the House Partnership. Jacquie has worked at GH for over twenty years originally as Practice Manager at Greystone House and lastly as Operations Manager co-ordinating the amalgamation of the three separate GP surgeries comprising the House Partnership. Jacquie has been a popular and efficient member of staff and has been a great supporter of our PPG and Health Champions. Jacquie’s advice and guidance will be missed and we send her our very best wishes for a long and happy retirement.

Dr York also mentioned that the Emma telephone system has recently been implemented. (See update from CVMP)

Moat House Surgery (MH) – Dr Anuradha Rajarajan

Dr Rajarajan reported that the practice Physician Assistant has recently left the practice. We have three new Registrar Doctors starting their training with us this month. Also, we are now a Registered Research Practice undertaking relevant medical research following strict ethical guidelines.

Caterham Valley Medical Practice ((CVMP) – Caroline Towers, Practice Manager

  • Welcome to Dr Sophie Cooper, registrar who will be with us for a year.
  • Reception Manager Caroline Hubbard left in May. Denise Smith stepped up to replace her supported by Donna.
  • Augusta, Lada and Maya are our new receptionists
  • The new Nurse to replace Lauren is called Emily. She will be starting in September.
  • The empty former Boots space in the entrance hall - we are unable to convert this into clinical space for the practice as no funding from NHSE has been forthcoming. 
  • Emma our Artificial Intelligent (AI) receptionist will be operational soon. Emma is a virtual phone assistant designed to answer your calls instantly and eliminate long waiting queues. When you call the practice, EMMA will pick up quickly and ask you a few simple questions about the reason for your call, securely passing your detailed request directly to our clinical or administrative team for review. The system has built-in safety protocols to immediately route urgent medical emergencies to emergency services or a staff member. Please be assured that human help is always available; if you prefer not to use the automated system, or if it struggles to understand you, you can simply ask to be put straight through to our receptionist team.

Any Other Business

LAR asked the GPs present their views and experience with the NHS Advice & Guidance (A&G) system. A&G is a protocol within the NHS where patients referred to hospital by a GP for tests, investigations or Consultant appointments may not necessarily result in a patient appointment at the hospital. Patient referrals will be initially ‘screened’ by a medical professional at the hospital who may determine that on the diagnosis and evidence provided a hospital appointment may not necessarily be the best way forward and the hospital Consultant or medical professional at the hospital will provide Advice & Guidance to the referring GP on the best way forward in dealing with the patient condition.

Whilst, this protocol is not necessarily a bad thing, it does rely on both the hospital and GP being open and honest with each other and should not be seen as opportunity to reduce patient waiting list by rationing care. It requires good, timely and efficient communications between both parties to determine what is in the patients’ best interests.

Both Dr Hamilton from CVMP and Dr Josie York stated that their experience with this protocol had been nothing other than excellent. Dr Hamilton went on to explain that in previous years hospitals received funding on every procedure or appointment undertaken. In essence, the more they did then the greater their funding so it could be seen that this encouraged possible over treatment by undertaking diagnostic tests that may not have been necessary. This has all now changed in that hospitals and secondary care providers are funded on an annual grant determined by NHS England on various criteria including population growth and social factors. In his experience A&G has worked well and he has valued relevant advice from his specialist medical colleagues at hospitals. LAR thanked both Drs Hamilton and Josie York for their clear explanation and reassurance.

Michelle Wettone, Business Relations Manager at North Downs hospital (Ramsay Healthcare) attended the meeting. Michelle advised that she would be happy to arrange a presentation by any of the Consultants operating at North Downs at a PPG future meeting. Suggestions to LAR please on which speciality will be of most interest to members before I contact Michelle

Location of future meetings – the rotation of meetings between the three surgeries was generally welcomed but views were mixed between midday or evening meetings. It was agreed that midday meetings were better in winter and possibly evening meetings in the summer to enable attendance by ‘working’ patients.

Date of Next Meeting

Date and location to be agreed.