Are our Doctors competent?

dmg24

Red_Doe wrote: »

Imo it`s the doctors. The doctor here has misdiagnosed at least three people I know of, resulting in the death of one, who herself had been a nurse and from her own symptoms suspected cancer. Doc disagreed and refused to refer her. Months later she died.

This demonstrates my point perfectly - why on earth did she not present herself at the hospital? Surely if the GP should have been able to tell that she needed further help, she should have been able to also?

Red_Doe wrote: »

Legal avenues and processes aside, often, medical folks band together and DO stick up for themselves. And it makes no sense to me for the final sayso on malpractice to be given by a medical official, surely it should be someone independant of, but with knowledge of, medical practice?
The `system`, as with so many other systems, often simply does not work.

Any malpractice case will be decided by those in the judiciary, not clinicians.

Red_Doe

dmg24 wrote: »

This demonstrates my point perfectly - why on earth did she not present herself at the hospital? Surely if the GP should have been able to tell that she needed further help, she should have been able to also?



Any malpractice case will be decided by those in the judiciary, not clinicians.

She didn`t make it to hospital. To understand you`d need to see how remote this place is. She was a retired nurse but elderly and infirm with no close relatives and no personal transport. The doctor refused to sanction the already hard to get hospital transport for her.
When I made my complaint I got as far as the Medical Ombudsman and when it was not upheld was basically told, that`s it, sorry.

Toothsmith

How much would we be complaining if every time we went to a Dr, we were treated as a suspected malignancy and sent off for biopsies/endoscopy?

Quite apart from bankrupting the NHS, it really wouldn't be much fun! ( I know - I've had a camera up my bottom!)

Lara44

My nephew in law had abdominal pains in December and his Mum took his to the Drs who diagnosed a chest infection! SIL thought it was very strange so she took him to A+E just in time to avoid a burst appendix. His Dad suffered with IBS for 15 years which turned out after tests to be a blocked pipe in his liver.

If the Dr fails to persuade you, always seek a second opinion. If a problem has been persisting, go to see another Dr at the practice, or better still go to another practice altogether. In my area this website gives reviews of local practices, not sure it's relevant to everyone though.

Catslovelycats

Re OP's original question:
I don't know. But I do wish they'd stop signing off incompetent staff with 'stress'...

Toothsmith

It must be quite stressful to be incompetent though!

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

Depends, but I would say that if you report to them that you have problem defecating/stomach pain/weight loss and dark stool and they don't ask if they can perform and examination, I would suspect that they are leaning towards the incompetent side of the equation. (There is a local surgery who has a doctor with vision so poor, he has a bright pink car so he can identify it in the carpark, and he has a problem with elderly people with bowel problems. The trouble is that 5 have died of bowel/colorectal cancer in the last 18 months when he has said they should eat prunes. Patients are leaving the practice in droves - the ones that aren't feet first. His second job is an assessor for ATOS. - no, this isn't a joke and isn't made up - I suppose it fits in with his GMC hearings)

ellay864

I agree with the poster who said that all those repeated 10 mins appointments add up. Missing something on one short consultation is understandable but recurrence should be properly investigated. A work friend had been repeatedly seeing her doctor about an itchy rash - I mean seriously bad itchy rash over arms, legs, torso. She also at times complained of breathlessness - she was a very fit lady who didnt smoke, ate sensibly etc. She also mentioned having hot sweats but said she'd put that down to onset of menopause. Each time she was reassured the breathlessness was probably stress and the itch was an allergy (though testing found no sign of what she was allergic to). After almost a year of this she ended up going to her doctor feeling much worse with the breathing and he reluctantly agreed to her husband's suggestion that she should get looked at better and she went off for a chest x-ray - 2 hours later she was admitted to hospital and after a few days of more tests they confirmed stage 4 Hodgkin's Lymphoma. Apparently the breathlessness and rash are two really typical symptoms but nobody had put the 2 together. That was August 2009 - she's still undergoing chemotherapy now.
But it wasn't just the GP. She was referred to her local hospital in Chester but wasn't happy - they took ages to book her appointments for scans and x-rays and ages to get results. In the end she asked to be referred to a specialist at Christie's where she has had more more prompt treatment, scans booked in quickly, results told within a couple of days. She still doesn't know what the future holds but at least she feels she's in the best place and has a fighting chance. But to make it worse, when she asked to be referred the doc at the Chester hospital got really defensive and basically said she couldnt be surprised at being ill as she'd left it so long to get advice. So it's actually all the patients' fault!!

poorandindenial

concerned43 wrote: »

Having worked in the NHS for 15 years I feel something has went horribly wrong with our healthcare. I am really focusing on GPs and frontline A&E staff.
Don't believe the issue is lack of time but more that their knowledge is lacking. Why aren't we asked to rate our GPs so that further action could be taken, if proved negligent, by a Government Body?

You are, search for your GP on nhs.uk or a website called patient opinion. Nhs.uk is government run, the other isn't. If you think they are actually negligent you can contact the general medical council.

RadoJo

I have to say, I've generally had good experiences with the NHS, and the only times I have been unsatisfied have been when I have been unable to be specific about or downplayed my symptoms or they aren't showing on the day I happen to have an appointment, but I have also had my GP call me in the evening after an appt during the day to check that I was ok (suspected appendicitis - turned out to be a random stomach pain that disappeared two days later but was never explained).

On the other hand, I had an operation done privately and they bu99ered it up - they were supposed to remove 6 teeth but only took two and then had to go back again for another round! However I wouldn't decry private healthcare on that basis - it's just my experience (and after all, I'd rather they took too few teeth out than too many!).