A town centre medical centre which has more than 8,000 on its books has been rated inadequate and placed into special measures following an inspection by the Care Quality Commission (CQC).

Dr K E Wilcox and Partners, also known as The Medical Centre, in London Road, Sittingbourne, was visited by officials in March who said it was inadequate for being well-led and safe and requires improvement for being effective but was good for being caring and responsive to people’s needs.

When it was last inspected in 2015, it was rated as requiring improvement.

In the report, released yesterday, inspectors highlighted issues including "not all staff understood what constituted an incident or near miss, and not all were recorded" and said risks to patients were "not always assessed and well managed".

It also said the practice did not have a good enough supply of medicines and equipment to respond to medical emergencies in line with national guidance.

Five patients were spoken to during the inspection who said they were "satisfied with the care they received and thought staff were approachable, committed and caring" but "all also commented that they found it difficult to get through to the practice by telephone and make an appointment that suited their needs".

The surgery currently has two full time GPs, two part-time GPs and locums.

Ruth Rankine, deputy chief inspector of General Practice CQC's south region, said: "Our inspectors had previously carried out an inspection at the Medical Centre in June 2015 and this new inspection was to follow up on our initial concerns and focus on the work the practice had carried out since that first visit.

"It is worrying that despite the concerns identified at that first inspection, our team found a further decline in the standards and a number of additional concerns.

"Patients were at risk of harm because systems currently in place were not embedded well enough to keep them safe. For example, not all staff understood what constituted an incident or near miss, leaving patients at risk of being unsafe.

"With this in mind we had no option but to place the practice into special measures. We will re-inspect the practice within six months to check whether sufficient improvements have been made.

"If we find that the service provided by this surgery remains inadequate, we will consider further action."

Staff at The Medical Centre must now comply with three legal requirements relating to care and provide inspectors with information on how they plan to do this.

You can read the full report here.