An “inadequate” health centre which had been in special measures in Stepney has managed to pull through the Covid emergency and improved with a good overall rating.

The Harford centre in Ben Jonson Road has been given a clean bill of health by the Care Quality Commission after its previous poor rating by inspectors.

The centre with nearly 10,000 patients is now rated good for being “effective, caring, responsive and well-led”.

It “required improvement” at its previous inspection, but now all specific concerns that had been identified have been rectified, the commission found.

There were some issues about managing specific medicines, but the practice had taken action and showed it had processes in place for managing risk.

“We are taking this service out of special measures,” the cared commission’s deputy chief London inspector Vicki Wells said. “We recognise the improvements at the Harford centre and hope it can be sustained and even improved.”

The practice had taken on board the feedback from its GP patient survey for 2020 and put in place an plan to try and improve the service. It now meets the needs of patients, the care commission stressed, which meant the centre had jumped from being ‘inadequate’ to ‘good’ overall.