CQC is back — and it's not starting with struggling practices. Under the Return to Good and Outstanding programme, practices rated Good years ago are being re-assessed first. Daniel Vincent, former Practice Manager and Registered Manager who led his own practice from Inadequate to Good, has analysed all 126 published focused assessments from the programme so far. The headline is reassuring: all 126 retained their Good rating (assessments that escalate to full inspection are published separately). But the detail is a wake-up call — around one in three were pulled up on something, and every single weakness sat in the same place: not the quality of care, but the ability to evidence it. This session decodes exactly what inspectors examined, where Good practices came unstuck, and the specific fixes to make before your practice's turn comes.

• -Understand how the focused Return to Good assessment works — which 10 quality statements are re-rated, what carries forward, and what the pre-inspection process actually looks like
• -Identify the small number of evidence areas where Good practices were most often pulled up — staffing records, immunisation oversight, premises risk assessments and governance documentation
• -Recognise the difference between a practice that feels confident and one that can prove readiness — and why every weakness in the data sat in the evidence layer, not care quality
• -Leave with a prioritised list of fixes your practice can start on the same week, based on what inspectors actually asked for