Integrated Care PartnershipFollowing the announcement by the Prime Minister of the relaxation of the Covid restrictions from Monday 19th July, we wanted to let you know how ICP and its four surgeries will be operating.
The NHS Infection Control Board have advised us that we should maintain all Covid restrictions whilst the Delta variant remains prolific in Surrey. So there will be no change to mandatory face coverings when entering our surgeries, the maintenance of social distancing as well as the need for separate entrance and exit to ensure no cross-over of patient traffic. Anti-bacterial hand gel and taking of temperatures on arrival will also remain in place.
However, we do understand the need to open our doors to patients to begin our journey of returning to normal. Therefore, our doors will now be open. This will be an anxious time for both patients and staff, and in order to manage the flow of patients we will be putting in place red / green entrance lights, which will indicate when you are able to enter the surgery to maintain social distancing. We ask you to work with us and adhere when the lights are red.
Receptions at Old Cottage Hospital, Fitznells Manor Surgery and Cox Lane will be open for collection of paperwork, collection of sample pots and signing in for appointments. However, patients will not be able to book on the day appointments by attending at the beginning of the day as they did pre-Covid, as all patients will still need to be triaged through our website.
We have been seeing many patients face-to-face throughout the entire pandemic, but now, once medically triaged, we will have a larger number of appointments available for patients to be booked in to see doctors face-to-face. This need will be determined by the doctor due to medical need.
Stoneleigh Medical Centre will remain closed for general clinics at present, but continue with housing our Baby Clinic. Once we progress through the lifting of the lockdown and the reduction of the Delta variant, we will review regularly our position, again in line with the Infection Control Board. We do know that this will disappoint a number of our Stoneleigh patients, but due to the building layout, we are unable to maintain the restrictions necessary to manage patient traffic flow, due to no separate entrance / exit.
Please bear with us whilst we try and work with all the restrictions and begin to open our surgeries as much as possible, whilst maintaining patient and staff safety. We understand that it is a challenging and worrying time for everyone, but we do ask you to comply with all restrictions when entering our buildings.