Your voice on health matters

Who are they and what do they do, you may be wondering?

All GP surgeries in England are required to have a Patient Participation Group (PPG) to help provide the practice with the patient’s perspective. They act as a route for patients to advise and inform GP practices on what matters most to them and help to identify solutions to problems. It’s not a forum for complaints, which should go direct to the practice through the normal channels.

PPGs are initially set up by each surgery, who invite volunteers from within their patient population to form the group. The PPG then set up a committee, decide on their objectives and run their own meetings with input from the surgery. The activities of each PPG vary depending on the needs of the practice population, which they need to identify and respond to.

What does Mere PPG do?

We’re very lucky in Mere to have a surgery that has been ranked 2nd in the region for quality of service*, with 99% of patients ranking their experience as good, which means that we don’t spend all our time dealing with issues. Our activities can be broken down into three main areas:

• Acting as a ‘voice’ for your issues and working with the practice and wider network to find solutions to meet the needs of our community.
• Organising health promotion events to help you understand common health issues and how to prevent or manage them.
• Helping to fill gaps in services by signposting the support that is available locally.

We generally consist of a group of 10-15 members plus a surgery representative who meet bi-monthly, with smaller sub-groups meeting more frequently if required. Over the last few years we have organised talks on prostate cancer, childhood illnesses, sight loss, diabetes and end of life planning, to name a few, and we hope to continue to organise these events once it is safe to do so. Since the onset of COVID-19, we have been communicating online, via email or outdoors as required, but clearly our activities have had to be limited.

If you have any questions for us or would like to raise any issues, then please email: MerePPG@gmail.com

Mere Surgery NHS GP Patient Survey 2020

If you wish to join the PPG, please use our PPG Registration form.