Patients kept safe by GMC’s effective handling of complaints against doctors

The profession and the public can be confident that ensuring patient and public safety is at the core of all the fitness to practise decisions made by the General Medical Council, an audit by the Council for Healthcare Regulatory Excellence (CHRE) finds

The audit, the first of its kind undertaken by the CHRE, found that the GMC’s processes and procedures for cases involving doctors whose fitness to practise is in doubt are “effective” and are “dealt with in a timely manner”. Patient and public safety, and maintaining public confidence in doctors, are the highest priorities for the GMC’s operations.

The audit found the GMC’s “high quality and robust procedures”, including detailed guidance for its staff on dealing with complaints, ensure a thorough approach to assessing concerns about doctors’ fitness to practise and appropriate and timely decision making.

A number of areas were highlighted as good practice, including the IT and case management system, the internal quality assurance team, arrangements for liaison with employers, arrangements for dealing with drink driving convictions and ‘signposting’ for complainants when the matter is not one for the GMC.

Niall Dickson, Chief Executive of the General Medical Council said:

“The GMC’s priority is to ensure patient safety when dealing with those doctors who are not safe to practise medicine. The vast majority of doctors in the UK are good doctors but everyone needs to have confidence that we are responding quickly and effectively when it comes to the small number who could pose a risk to patients.

“We must never be complacent and there will always be lessons we can learn, but the audit by the Council for Health Regulatory Excellence shows that the profession and the public can have confidence in the way we manage complaints about doctors.”

-ENDS-

Notes to Editors:

For further information please contact the Media Relations Office on 020 7189 5454, out of hours 020 7189 5444, email press@gmc-uk.org, website www.gmc-uk.org.

Please find a link to the CHRE Report: http://www.chre.org.uk/media/18/177/

The General Medical Council registers and licenses doctors to practise medicine in the UK. Our purpose is summed up in the phrase: Regulating doctors, Ensuring Good Medical Practice.

The law gives us four main functions:

• keeping up-to-date registers of qualified doctors
• fostering good medical practice
• promoting high standards of medical education
• dealing firmly and fairly with doctors whose fitness to practise is in doubt

Merger of PMETB with GMC

From 1 April 2010, (subject to legislation) the functions of the Post Graduate Medical Education and Training Board (PMETB) will be transferred to the GMC, creating a simpler and clearer framework for the regulation of medical education and training.

In February 2008, the Secretary of State announced that PMETB would be merged with the GMC, following a recommendation from Sir John Tooke’s Independent Inquiry into Modernising Medical Careers. Following the merger, all stages of medical education and training will fall under the GMC’s remit. For more information please visit www.gmc-uk.org or www.pmetb.org.uk

Office of the Health Professions Adjudicator (OHPA)

From April 2011, the adjudication of fitness to practise cases involving doctors will transfer from the GMC to a new body called the Office of the Health Professions Adjudicator (OHPA). OHPA is being established under the Health and Social Care Act 2008. It is being created to ensure clear separation between the investigation of fitness to practise cases and the process of determining whether a professional’s fitness to practise is impaired.

To begin with, the new body will be responsible for making decisions on fitness to practise cases brought forward by the GMC and, in time, the General Optical Council. Over time, other regulators of healthcare professionals may transfer their adjudication functions to OHPA. For more information about OHPA, please visit www.ohpa.org.uk

The GMC will remain the regulator for doctors, continuing to set the standards for professional practice and receiving and investigating allegations about their fitness to practise.