Vision, Mission, Values & Strategy

About Willesden Green Surgery

Willesden Green Surgery is a family-run practice - The Najim family moved to Willesden Green in 1990 and has never looked back! As lifelong local residents, we're passionate about giving back to our local Willesden Green community.

Opening in 1996, under the stewardship of Dr Najim senior, his dedication to the local Irish community was recognised with a Papal blessing. Over the last 5 years, Dr Najim has been joined by three of his children who are now GPs, and their spouses, creating a team of seven GPs from the Najim family. The Willesden Green Surgery family has since been joined by passionate local GPs, pharmacists, nurses and other skilled healthcare professionals.

Willesden Green Surgery is proud to look after the health of over 11,000 local patients, growing from 3,000 patients just 5 years ago. This growth has been accompanied with a new vision and strategy (outlined below) to provide the highest quality care but with our same compassionate community values.

To ensure patients receive the highest quality preventative and acute care, that is easy and convenient for local residents to access, in a truly friendly setting.

Our Mission

Our Vision

To take the NHS back to the future, by maintaining the "family doctor" whilst embracing innovation, efficiency and change, in order to support excellent health, to drive local social growth and wellbeing.

Our Core Values

Innovation

We drive improvements in efficiency and quality of care, through early adoption of new technologies and better ways of working.

Inclusion

We ensure that nobody is left behind, by ensuring all our communities receive the same, fair access to great care; focusing on tackling health inequalities and digital exclusion.

Collaboration

We work closely with our patients, staff, neighbouring GP practices, hospitals and all stakeholders to deliver integrated, responsive care.

Education

We ensure lifelong learning as a training practice for doctors, nurses, and allied clinical and non-clinical staff. Our ethos of learning extends to patient education and empowerment .

Compassion

We ensure that every contact embodies the love and care that we have for our patients, providing a safe and welcome space in a busy world.

Sustainable

We look after the environment and community around us to ensure that future generations can prosper with the responsible decisions we have made.

Our Strategic Priorities

1. To improve access to GP appointments

We have a unique system whereby any patient who contacts the practice at anytime, can receive an appointment with a clinician the same day.
We are open on weekends.
By maintaining a high access rate of over 700 appointments per 1,000 patients a month, compared to the national average of 400 appointments per 1,000 patients.
We maintain an average telephone call queue time of less than 2 minutes and have a queue call-back facility on our phone lines. We are also trialling an innovative, automated call triage.
We also ensure easy access to appointments which can be booked 24/7 via the NHS App, by calling reception, coming in or submitting an eConsult.
Our receptionists are always at hand, friendly and trained to install the NHS App on patients' phone for them, and teach them how to use it.

2. To improve preventative care

Prevention is better than cure. Our patients have a high uptake of cancer screening such as prostate and cervical cancer screening. This has been encouraged through efficient, automated and manual recall systems and in-house weekend appointments for cervical smear tests.
We similarly have a high rate of screening for cardiovascular risk factors including high blood pressure, diabetes, high cholesterol, obesity, inactivity and smoking. Interventions include early treatment with lifestyle/medication and support from our in-house yoga & meditation sessions, dietitian, health and wellbeing coach, and social prescriber.

3. To support wider economic and social growth

By providing over 30 jobs for local residents with a large number of opportunities for funded training and career progression.
We also support employee wellbeing through initiatives such as our free Bikes for Employees Scheme and free Healthy Workplace Snacks.
We are looking to develop an ambitious Health & Wellbeing Centre in the local area, to support the creation of 100 well-paid local jobs, and introduce a larger range of new Health & Wellbeing services for residents. We hope to be able to share these plans with patients in the summer of 2024, and hold focus groups to co-create the development together as one community.

4. To reduce health inequalities

We prioritise proactive care for vulnerable groups such as those with Severe Mental Illness (SMI), Learning Disabilities (LD) and asylum seekers. Each of these groups has a lead, responsible clinician at the practice. We maintain a high achievement rate of over 70% for SMI and LD health checks.
We serve a large number of asylum seekers from the Middle East, and work with charities such as the Iraqi Welfare Association to provide English classes and support.
We are dedicated to being a Safe Surgery, allowing patients to access healthcare from all walks for life, without the need for documentation.
We employ bilingual English and Arabic speaking front of house staff to break down communication barriers for patients and improve their access to their healthcare.
We pride ourselves in being an LGBTQ-friendly practice, ensuring people feel confident to use our services no matter who you are and we are committed to making sure all our patients feel supported and listened to

5. To be early adopters of digital innovations

We have an extremely high usage of electronic prescriptions and number of appointments booked online using the NHS App.
We have championed the use of the NHS App to empower patients to monitor their health.
We utilise innovative digital health tools including AI stethoscopes to detect heart failure, point of care ultrasound during consultations, and free BP machines for home monitoring.

6. To ensure high quality and responsive care

We are always listening to our patients to constantly improve our service. This was reflected in the national GP survey in 2023, with Willesden Green Surgery rated second in Brent for overall experience of GP Practice.
We love to hear what our patients have to say, and our PPGs have over 50 attendees every sitting.
We have one of the highest early detection rates in the UK. We are one of 12 practices in NHS Northwest London that has a detection rate of greater than 65% over the last 5 years.
We have one of the lowest UCC and A&E rates, as our patients are able to access our clinicians same day.
We are integrating primary and secondary care by providing certain hospital services in our practice. This includes complex ultrasound guided joint injections, ear microsuction, insulin initiation, warfarin monitoring and access to doctors with special interests in dermatology, diabetes and ENT.