• The Practice has 8 partners, 2 full time salaried doctors and 1 part time salaried doctor.
  (The 8 partner doctors work together as a non-limited partnership)
• The Practice has a Business Manager who heads up the Nursing, Reception and Administration teams.
  
• The Practice is a teaching practice and has registrar doctors on site.
  
• The Practice also has District Nurses, Health Visitors and Midwife teams based at the surgery.

• The Practice also hosts Speech and Language Therapy sessions, counselling services, a Job Centre plus advisor, the Community Council Office and a weekly Police surgery.
  

Our premises has easy access for the disabled that include disabled parking spaces, accessible entrance and a lift.

Since January 2006 we have a new appointments system, Advanced Access. This means that you can be seen faster than before; usually on the same day you request an appointment. A number of Doctors will be available each day.

How does Advanced Access work?

Call before 12 pm and you will usually be offered an appointment for the same day. Approximatley 20% of our appointments can be booked in advance. We therefore encourage you to make appointments on the day when you need them.

Phone lines for appointments will be open from 8.00 a.m-6.00pm. The phone system operates a queuing facility. You could be in the queue for up to 15 mins at peak times. Please be patient as the queue does go down quickly. On average a call is answered in 7 minutes at 8.15am on a weekday. If you do not want an appointment please ring after

10 am to ease congestion and avoid long waiting times.

Practice Area

Our practice area is limited to the Brackla, Coity and Litchard areas of Bridgend and includes the village of Coychurch. New patients living in these areas can register by calling at reception. We will continue to provide services to registered patients living in the rest of Bridgend and the villages of Corntown, Ewenny, Ogmore-by-Sea, Southerndown, St. Brides Major and Colwinston.   see MAP

If you live within our practice area and would like to register as a patient with us please visit reception to fill out the necessary forms.

The premises have a car park for patient use while visiting the surgery.

Surgery Opening Times

Premises open Monday to Friday - 8.30am - 6.00pm
Telephone Lines open Monday to Friday - 8.00am - 6.30pm

The surgery is closed the last Tuesday afternoon of every month for in-house training for all staff and doctors. Primecare out of hours service will be available on 0845 6011 186 on this afternoon from 12.00pm. They also cover weekends and when the surgery lines close in the week at 6.30pm till 8.00am the next morning.

Compliments and Complaints

We like to receive compliments but we also want to know if we can improve our service. Please let us know. There is a practice in-house complaints procedure to deal with your concerns and the service that we provide. We aim to respond to any complaint within 5 working days and to report back to you within 20 days, although in some cases more time may be required

Please contact the practice business manager Mr David Blower or, in his absence, Mrs Pat Hayward who will be pleased to assist you.

www.wales.gov.uk/nhscomplaints

Zero Tolerance

If a patient is violent or abusive to doctors or staff their actions may be reported to the police. They will be removed from the practice list and may be reported as a violent patient. This could result in an initial 12 month period of debarment from receiving primary care at a surgery and will be seen only in a recognized violent patient center by appointment only.

Confidentiality

Everyone working in the NHS has a legal duty to keep information about you confidential. The practice is a data controller under the Data Protection Act 1998 and is registered with the Protection Commissioner who ensures that information is kept legally and fairly.

Information about you may need to be shared with other people, e.g. registration details with the Business Service Centre in Swansea and Cardiff. In some instances the law requires us to pass on information e.g. to notify a birth. All persons receiving information from us will also have legal responsibility to keep your information confidential.

Home Visit

Home visits are only available for people too ill to come to surgery or are housebound. Lack of transport is not a valid reason for a home visit. We have a duty doctor each morning that will check all requests for house calls to judge their urgency and normally you will be telephoned back. It is important to have requests in by 11.00am.

Publication Scheme

The aim of the Scheme is to explain what information Oak Tree Surgery makes available to the public, and wherever possible provide an easy method of accessing this information. Our publication scheme ensures that we meet the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. The Act requires every public authority to specify what information they publish (in terms of information 'classes'), how the information is made available, and whether it is available free of charge or upon payment.