Lees Solicitors - Concern over out-of-hours GP care - Stephen Lewis

Clinical Negligence News

Concern over out-of-hours GP care - Stephen Lewis


Concern over out-of-hours GP care - Stephen Lewis

A report by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) has raised concerns about the quality of treatment patients receive for out-of-hours GP care in England.

A review into the NHS was ordered after it was alleged that badly trained doctors were being employed to look after patients at nights and weekends.

The CQC says there are fears Primary Care Trusts across England may not be effectively monitoring out-of-hours performance and risk failing to spot patient safety concerns.

It claims the NHS is only "scratching the surface" when it comes to looking at the quality of GP services outside normal hours, used by 9 million patients every year.

In some cases it found that foreign doctors employed did not speak very good English and may be overworked due to a lack of adequate checks being carried out.

The CQC has recommended that "all PCTs should scrutinise out-of-hours services more closely".

"They should look in detail at the services that they commission, including the efficiency of call handling and triage, the number of unfilled shifts, the proportion of shifts covered by non-local doctors, the induction and training those doctors receive and the quality of the decisions made by clinical staff."

Responding to the review, Katherine Murphy, the director of the Patients Association said "Why do NHS managers need to be told that they should ensure out-of-hours care is safe? It is such a vital service, sometimes dealing with very vulnerable patients."

"There have been other cases where patients died when they received poor care from out-of-hours services. Why didn't NHS managers act then? How many alarm bells need to ring before action is taken?"

In 2004, GPs were allowed to opt out of providing out-of-hours care, with PCTs taking on the role of providing cover. The PCTs commissioned out-of-hours services from a range of organisations including private firms, GP co-operatives and in-house teams at the PCT.

However last year, the NHS Alliance group of NHS staff said family doctors should take back responsibility for providing out-of-hours care as patients had lost confidence in the new arrangements.

Professor Steve Field, the chairman of the Royal College of General Practitioners, said more family doctors needed to get involved in commissioning out-of-hours services.

He said "Providers need to ensure their doctors are competent to the level of UK trained graduates, have good English skills, are not over-tired after working long shifts and are orientated to the local conditions."

At Lees Solicitors LLP our clinical negligence team deal with a variety of matters, including substandard care provided by GPs. Please contact a member of our team on 0151 647 9381 or 0800 387 927.

Stephen Lewis

 

This article provides a summary of a recent case/change in law/news item. It is intended for general information purposes only and is not to be relied upon. It does not constitute legal advice and should not be treated under any circumstances as a substitute for legal advice. Lees Solicitors LLP does not accept any responsibility for any loss that may arise from reliance upon the information contained within this article. The copyright in this article is owned by Lees Solicitors LLP and permission must be sought before reproduction or publishing.


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