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Complaints in General Practice

Complaints in General Practice. SHAHKUR SHABIR GP HALF DAY RELEASE PRESENTATION 2 nd March 2011. Initial Steps. If a patient is not happy with the treatment they have received, they have a right to complain. As a first step, you could talk to: your GP, or

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Complaints in General Practice

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  1. Complaints in General Practice SHAHKUR SHABIR GP HALF DAY RELEASE PRESENTATION 2nd March 2011

  2. Initial Steps If a patient is not happy with the treatment they have received, they have a right to complain. As a first step, you could talk to: • your GP, or • the practice manager at your GP surgery. In many cases, the problem can be solved straightaway, and you won’t need to take your complaint any further.

  3. Help and advice • If you don't feel comfortable about talking to your GP or practice manager, you may want to seek advice. • All NHS trusts and Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) have a complaints manager who can advise you about making a complaint. Your GP surgery should also have someone who oversees complaints. You can also get advice about your complaint from: • your local Patient Advisory Liaison Service (PALS), or • your local Independent Complaints and Advocacy Service (ICAS).

  4. PALS and ICAS • PALS can tell you more about the NHS complaints procedure and may be able to help you resolve your complaint informally. • ICAS is a national service that supports people who want to make a complaint about their NHS care or treatment.

  5. Some Figures • 2008/09 found that 48,597 formal concerns were recorded against GPs and dentists • The MDU logged 517 complaints in 2007/08, up from 337 in 2005/06. Almost a quarter of the complaints here were concerning a delay or failure in diagnosing a condition.

  6. Resolving a Complaint

  7. STAGE 1: Local Resolution • You can complain verbally or in writing. • A large health centre will normally have a complaints manager. The manager should make a written record of your complaint. • A smaller centre, or practice, may not have a complaints manager, but they will still have someone who is responsible for dealing with complaints.

  8. Time Limit The time limit for a complaint is normally: • 12 months from the date that the event happened, or • 12 months from the date that you first became aware of it.

  9. STAGE 2: Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman • If your complaint is not resolved successfully after the above attempts, you can complain to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (P&HSO). • The Ombudsman is independent of the NHS and government.

  10. Your Rights You have the right to: • have your complaint dealt with efficiently, and properly investigated • know the outcome of any investigation into your complaint • take your complaint to the independent Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman if you're not satisfied with the way the NHS has dealt with your complaint • make a claim for judicial review if you think you've been directly affected by an unlawful act or decision of an NHS body, and • receive compensation if you've been harmed.

  11. Medical negligence by a GP Most wrong diagnoses happen when a person is suffering from a serious illness which has similar symptoms to a much more common and trivial complaint and the GP makes the decision that the patient is suffering from the latter.

  12. Most common childhood misdiagnoses • Appendicitis • Meningitis • diabetes mellitus • slipped femoral epiphysis.

  13. Top ten Common themes for complaints • Clinical care and treatment, including delays in referral or diagnosis • Patients often complained that they should have been referred sooner for specialist treatment or further investigation of their symptoms. • Removal of patients from GP lists – • Some GPs did not warn patients that certain behaviour could lead to them being taken off a list or explain to people why they had taken action. • Safety - • issues included a mix up over names leading to a child having the wrong injection

  14. Care surrounding a death - • Families may receive confusing information from different staff caring for a relative. In others, relatives felt that they were unprepared for the death or had no time to arrange for family members to be present. • Nursing - • Common were complaints about staff attitudes and the dignity of patientsand no help with feeding. • Discharge from hospital and service coordination  – • serious cases involved the discharge of vulnerable patients including children and the elderly without any support or at inappropriate times of the day.

  15. Cleanliness and healthcare associated infection - • E.g Staff not washing hands between patients. • Record keeping- • Poor record keeping and misplaced records • Out-of-hours GP services – • Concerns were raised about inadequate assessment and treatment and a failure to visit vulnerable patients.

  16. GP surgeries are very busy. • GPs will usually see in excess of 100 patients every week and spend an average of 13 minutes with each person. • It is unsurprising that some mistakes are made and a small percentage of patients are not happy.

  17. To avoid complaints one of the most important factors for a doctor is to LISTEN

  18. THANK YOU

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