The CQC has developed a suite of clinical searches which are now routinely used when carrying out inspections of GP practices. They were designed to focus on areas of clinical importance, reflecting the profession’s agreed shared view of quality and to contribute to a consistent regulatory approach. The majority of the searches focus on safe prescribing, monitoring of higher risk drugs, management of long term conditions and identification of potential missed diagnoses. They identify cohorts of patients who may require further attention.

In order to be open and transparent about the regulatory processes, CQC is working with Ardens who have created, reviewed and made the searches available on EMIS Web and SystmOne for GP practices. Cegedim Healthcare have made the searches available for Vision GP practices. The searches and business rules are available free of charge for all GP practices.

The CQC searches have been specifically designed to identify potential significant risk and often have a degree of tolerance built into them, for example in relation to the intervals for monitoring medicines. They are not intended to be used (nor should they be) as a substitute for a practice’s own governance systems and processes for managing patient care, which should be designed to meet a gold standard in accordance with national guidance. For further information, please see GP Mythbuster 12: Accessing medical records during inspections.

Version 2 of the CQC clinical searches are now available. This new version includes the original standard risk-based searches found in Version 1, as well as additional standard risk-based searches in the medicines requiring monitoring, medication review and medicines usage categories.

There is also now an additional folder containing enhanced searches based on national recommended monitoring intervals covering the Disease-Modifying Anti-Rheumatic Drugs (DMARDs), long term conditions and medicines requiring monitoring categories. These enhanced searches will be run, but not routinely reviewed during inspections. They are being introduced in response to feedback from providers and to encourage quality improvement. They will allow practices to demonstrate they are providing care in line with national guidance.