Dawlish Hospital

Dawlish Hospital operates from Barton Terrace in Dawlish, holding CQC registration as a hospital, within the South West region. The registered provider is Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust, the legal entity accountable to the regulator for the quality and safety of care delivered here.

A hospital brings together consultant-led specialties, diagnostics, operating theatres and inpatient beds on one registered site. Dawlish Hospital operates under CQC registration covering the specific regulated activities it performs — surgical procedures, diagnostic imaging, treatment of disease and disorder — and every doctor practising there is registered with the General Medical Council, with consultants listed on the specialist register.

England's hospital landscape mixes NHS trusts with independent hospitals, and the two increasingly interlock: independent hospitals deliver a substantial share of NHS-funded planned surgery — hips, knees, cataracts, hernias — under NHS choice rules, while also serving self-pay and insured patients. The same consultant frequently operates across both sectors; what changes is the funding route, the waiting time and the hotel services around the clinical core.

Administratively, the service falls under Devon, within the South West region, in a city with 24 registered healthcare providers of all types. That local footprint matters for social-care funding and community-service referrals, both of which are organised at local-authority level.

The CQC publishes inspection reports for registered locations as they are completed; the official record for this location is linked in the registration section below and is the most reliable public account of how the service performs.

Hospitals register with the CQC for defined regulated activities and populations. For Dawlish Hospital, the register records:

Services for everyone

This provider is registered without population restrictions — its service is open to the general public rather than limited to specific age bands or clinical groups. In practice this is the standard registration for mainstream services such as dental practices, GP surgeries and diagnostic clinics.

A practical rule when shortlisting: prefer depth over breadth. A provider registered precisely for your care group — and able to describe its training and staffing for it — usually outperforms one with a longer but shallower list of declarations. And if your needs cross two of these groups at once, make the service explain how it handles the combination; that answer predicts your experience better than any single rating.

Treat these declarations as the service's public promise — inspectors check against them, and you are entitled to ask exactly how each one shows up in staffing and daily practice.

This reflects the standard service range of a hospital; Dawlish Hospital will confirm which of these are offered on site and which are arranged by referral.

Outpatient consultations

Consultant appointments for diagnosis, treatment planning and follow-up across the hospital's specialties.

Planned (elective) surgery

Scheduled operations from day-case procedures to complex inpatient surgery, with pre-operative assessment beforehand.

Diagnostic imaging

On-site X-ray, ultrasound, CT and MRI supporting rapid work-up — often the practical advantage of hospital-based care.

Physiotherapy and rehabilitation

Pre- and post-operative rehabilitation that determines how much benefit surgery actually delivers.

Endoscopy

Camera investigations of the digestive tract for reflux, bleeding, anaemia and bowel-cancer surveillance.

Pre-operative assessment

Structured fitness-for-surgery checks — bloods, ECG, anaesthetic review — that reduce cancellations and complications.

Inpatient and day-case beds

Nursed beds with resident or on-call medical cover; independent hospitals must publish how emergencies are escalated.

Private GP and urgent appointments

Many independent hospitals offer rapid-access clinics that feed into specialist pathways on the same site.

To contact Dawlish Hospital directly, call 01626868500.

There are three doors into Dawlish Hospital. NHS-funded: exercise your legal right to choose at the GP referral stage — for most planned care you can pick any hospital holding an NHS contract for that treatment, including independent hospitals; waiting lists differ dramatically between hospitals, so ask your GP to show you the options. Insured: obtain pre-authorisation from your insurer, then book the consultant appointment. Self-pay: contact the hospital directly; most publish fixed-price packages and can see you within days.

Whichever route, the consultant is the pivotal choice. Check their GMC specialist registration, their subspecialty interest (a knee surgeon for a knee, not a general orthopaedist), and how many of your specific procedure they perform annually. Hospitals' private patient teams will tell you consultants' NHS base and practice volume if you ask directly.

Before surgery, use the pre-operative assessment properly: disclose every medication and health condition, ask what prehabilitation (exercise, smoking cessation, weight) would improve your outcome, and get the enhanced-recovery plan in writing — length of stay, physiotherapy schedule and follow-up arrangements.

Dawlish Hospital has not yet published opening hours on this profile (the official register does not capture them; they are added when a provider claims its listing). Ring the service (01626868500) to confirm today's hours before travelling — the two-minute call is cheaper than a wasted journey, especially around bank holidays.

As a rule of thumb for services of this type, phone lines are least pressured mid-morning and mid-afternoon on midweek days; Monday mornings carry the weekend's accumulated demand and are the slowest time to get through almost everywhere in healthcare.

A first appointment at a hospital is part assessment, part administration — and you control how productive the assessment half is.

Bring the paperwork that saves repeating yourself: a list of current medications with doses (a photo of the boxes works), any relevant hospital letters or test results, your NHS number if you know it, and glasses or hearing aids if you use them. If the appointment concerns someone you care for, bring evidence of any legal authority you hold — power of attorney documents change what staff can lawfully discuss with you.

Expect the first appointment to include identity and history checks, a discussion of what you need, and an examination or assessment appropriate to the service. Be direct about two things in particular: everything you are taking (including over-the-counter and herbal products), and what outcome you actually want — clinicians plan differently for "I want to be seen quickly" versus "I want the most thorough option".

Before you leave, make sure three questions have answers: what happens next, who does it, and when. Vague follow-up arrangements are where care most often goes adrift; a specific next step — a booked review, a named referral, a results date with a way to chase it — is the mark of a well-run service, and it is entirely reasonable to ask for it explicitly.

NHS-funded treatment at any contracted hospital is free at the point of use — the choice right costs you nothing. Self-pay surgery is usually offered as a fixed-price package; scrutinise what it covers: consultant and anaesthetist fees, implants/prostheses, imaging, physiotherapy, and — critically — the policy on treating complications and readmissions, which reputable packages include for a defined period.

With private medical insurance, confirm three things before admission: pre-authorisation for the specific procedure code, whether your chosen consultant charges within your insurer's fee schedule (or will shortfall-bill you), and any excess or out-patient limits on your policy. Hospitals' pricing teams handle these questions daily — use them.

You will find Dawlish Hospital at Barton Terrace,Dawlish. The EX7 9DH postcode places it in the EX7 district of Dawlish, and entering the full postcode into a sat-nav or maps app will route you precisely — or use the Google Maps link for this exact location.

For public transport, enter the full postcode into a journey planner (National Rail, Traveline or your maps app) rather than searching the service name. Drivers should ask about parking at the point of booking — availability differs sharply between town-centre and residential locations, and knowing before you travel removes the most common source of appointment-day stress.

Think about journey frequency before fixating on any single provider: a one-off assessment justifies travel, but ongoing care multiplies every mile. With 24 providers of all types across Dawlish, most neighbourhoods — including EX7 — have credible options within a short journey.

Accessibility needs are best flagged in advance: step-free access, hearing loops, interpreters and longer appointments are all reasonable adjustments providers are expected to accommodate under the Equality Act, and a note on your booking makes the visit run as it should.

If this location is not convenient, the nearest comparable alternative is Teignmouth Hospital, roughly 2.7 miles away — the nearby providers section below lists more options with distances.

The right questions do more than fill an appointment — they reveal how a hospital thinks. These are the ones that earn their place:

1. Who exactly will provide my care, and what is their professional registration?
2. What are the realistic timescales — first appointment, results, and treatment?
3. What will this cost in total, and what could add to that figure later?
4. What are the alternatives, including doing nothing for now?
5. How do you handle problems out of hours, and who do I contact?
6. What should I expect to feel or notice afterwards, and what would be a warning sign?
7. How will you keep my GP informed, and what gets written to my record?
8. If my needs change, how quickly can the plan change with them?

Write the answers down during the conversation — comparing them across two or three providers turns an anxious choice into an informed one.

Every provider on this site is registered with the Care Quality Commission — but registration is the floor, not the ceiling, and the public record lets you judge far more than the badge.

The CQC inspects against five questions — is the service safe, effective, caring, responsive and well-led — and publishes its findings. For Dawlish Hospital, the registered provider is Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust. The official CQC record for this location carries the current registration status, ratings where awarded, and every published inspection report.

The rating scale runs Outstanding, Good, Requires Improvement, Inadequate — and context matters when reading it. Good is the expected standard, not a consolation prize; Outstanding is genuinely rare and usually reflects exceptional leadership culture rather than better equipment. A Requires Improvement rating deserves a closer look at which of the five questions dragged it down: a responsive shortfall (waiting times, complaint handling) is a different risk from a safe shortfall (medicines, staffing). Some location types are inspected without ratings at all, so an unrated service is not a warning sign in itself.

Reading a report efficiently: start with the well-led section (it predicts everything else), then safe. Look at the direction of travel across the last two inspections rather than a single snapshot, and treat "requires improvement" with a credible action plan differently from the same rating with repeated findings. If anything in a report concerns you, raising it with the service directly is both fair and revealing — well-run providers answer plainly.

Every patient of a CQC-registered service holds a set of enforceable rights, and knowing them changes how confidently you can act when something is not right.

You are entitled to informed consent — a genuine explanation of options, risks and alternatives before treatment, in language you understand, with interpreters provided where needed. You have a right of access to your own records under UK GDPR, free of charge in most cases, within a month of asking. And under the Equality Act, providers must make reasonable adjustments for disability — from step-free access to communication formats — as a legal duty, not a favour.

If care falls short, complain in stages: first to the provider itself (every registered service must operate an accessible complaints procedure and respond within a defined timescale); then, for NHS-funded care, to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman — or for privately funded care, to the Independent Sector Complaints Adjudication Service where the provider subscribes. Local authority-funded social care complaints escalate to the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.

Two further channels matter. The CQC does not investigate individual complaints, but it wants to hear about poor care — reports feed directly into inspection planning, and you can tell it anything in confidence via its website. And if you need help making a complaint about NHS care, every area has a statutory independent advocacy service that is free to use; your council can point you to the current provider.

Dawlish has 24 CQC-registered healthcare providers in total, of which 1 are hospitals — so genuine comparison is possible before you commit. The full Dawlish directory and the local hospitals listing let you shortlist alongside this profile.

Of the 1 hospitals serving Dawlish, the right one depends on the procedure. Compare CQC ratings at the service level (surgery, outpatients) rather than the headline; ask for the hospital's volume in your procedure; and check practicalities that shape recovery — physiotherapy availability, visiting, and how post-discharge questions are handled. For NHS-funded care, compare waiting times through your GP's e-referral options before defaulting to the nearest name.

Where is Dawlish Hospital located?

Dawlish Hospital is at Barton Terrace,Dawlish, EX7 9DH, in Dawlish (South West region). The full postcode works in any sat-nav or journey planner.

How do I contact Dawlish Hospital?

Call 01626868500 during opening hours. For funding-route questions (NHS availability, fees), asking directly by phone gets the current position.

Is Dawlish Hospital regulated?

Yes — it is registered with the Care Quality Commission (location ID RA956) under the registered provider Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust. Registration is a legal requirement for delivering this type of care in England and brings ongoing inspection.

What are the nearest alternatives to Dawlish Hospital?

The closest comparable providers are Teignmouth Hospital (2.7 miles), Exmouth Hospital (4.2 miles), Mount Stuart Hospital (7.8 miles). Each has a full profile on this site with contact details and registration information.

Can I choose this hospital for NHS treatment?

For most planned (non-emergency) care, yes — the NHS gives you a legal right to choose any hospital with an NHS contract for your treatment at the point of GP referral, including independent hospitals. Ask your GP to compare waiting times when making the referral.

What should a self-pay surgery quote include?

A fixed price covering consultant and anaesthetist fees, theatre, implants, nursing, standard imaging, follow-up and a defined complications policy. Anything quoted "from" a price, or excluding the anaesthetist, is not a comparable quote.

How do I check a consultant's credentials?

Search the GMC online register for specialist registration, ask the hospital for the consultant's annual volume in your procedure, and look for subspecialty fit. Any reluctance to answer volume questions is itself an answer.

Does Dawlish Hospital treat NHS or private patients?

The public register does not record funding routes, and many providers serve both. Phone the service for the current position — NHS availability in particular changes as capacity fills and reopens, so today's answer beats anything a directory can cache.

Where does the information on this page come from?

Core details — name, address, registration, provider and specialisms — come from the Care Quality Commission register (Open Government Licence v3.0) and are refreshed monthly. Guidance sections reflect how services of this type work across the UK. Always confirm time-sensitive details such as opening hours directly with the provider.