Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To feel very sorry for this doctor

699 replies

runningpram · 31/12/2025 09:07

I feel the way this lady has been treated is appalling.
Obviously this wasn’t the right thing to do but she wasn’t leaving early and there was no patient detriment. Why were her managers not supporting her better?
Why on earth could not this have been sorted out within the practise without a formal disciplinary process? As a working mum I really feel for her. Could someone medical shed light on why this would have been blown up into such an issue?

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15422147/amp/GP-faked-medical-appointments-work-not-late-afternoon-school-run-suspended-practising-5-months.html

GP faked medical appointments at work so she could make school run

A family doctor who faked medical appointments at work so she would not be late for the afternoon school run has been suspended from treating patients.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15422147/amp/GP-faked-medical-appointments-work-not-late-afternoon-school-run-suspended-practising-5-months.html

OP posts:
Simonjt · 31/12/2025 09:22

noctilucentcloud · 31/12/2025 09:21

Or if a patient was thought to be ok / didn't need to be seen as they already had.

Show quote history

Yep, plus for people who are going on holiday it would lead to their travel insurance not being valid as they would have had GP appointments that they haven’t declared along with whatever symptoms the GP invented.

Sleepasaurus · 31/12/2025 09:23

She lied. She went out of her way to lie.
She knew that it was wrong but still chose to do it.

neonbluedog · 31/12/2025 09:24

It's the lying and falsifying medical records that are the main issues. She then continued to lie to her employers and lied when she originally reported herself. That brings the profession into disrepute. It's really tricky being a working mum, I sympathise, I work full time outside of the home and it is so difficult. I'm in a profession (vet) where I have also seen people add extra "fake" appointments at the end of the day (I don't condone this). But she went far beyond that.

Because I'm a vet, I know I have to stay late sometimes (if a dog that was hit by a car outside walks in at 6:59 I can't just leave and say tough, see you, the practice closes in 1 minute) so I have my childcare arrangements such that I can stay in an emergency.

DefiniteMeteor · 31/12/2025 09:24

It was a locum shift!!! A shift she volunteered to do and got paid a LOT of extra money to do. Over and above her normal working hours. It’s just fraud, end of.

DontFallInTheHaHa · 31/12/2025 09:25

YANBU.

Why was she put in a situation where she was so worried that her kids would be left in an empty school? And what made her resort to lying about it? I can’t imagine she jumped straight to lying, I think it’s likely it spiralled into lying because she had no other choice. Sounds like a very harmful and toxic cultures whereby workers weren’t allowed a work/life balance and women had to pretend they don’t have children.

Now there’s 1 less practicing GP, and who does that help? There are GPs making actual medical mistakes still prat king but a woman is sacked because gasp she prioritised her children.

It actually uncovers alarming misogyny IMO. I hope all the female GPs are ok

brennanbones · 31/12/2025 09:26

noctilucentcloud · 31/12/2025 09:21

Or if a patient was thought to be ok / didn't need to be seen as they already had.

Show quote history

She added patients she had already seen

roseteapot · 31/12/2025 09:26

She is disgusting and yes, she should have been struck off.

I work in healthcare and what she did was appalling. She falsified medical records- that is never ok in any universe, I dont give a crap if she had childcare issues. Imagine if the fake medical notes she wrote affected that patient's care if they ended up in A&E or of something serious happened to one of them and it affected their treatment.

It's not ok. She could have employed a nanny to pick her kids up. Zero sympathy.

ilovesooty · 31/12/2025 09:26

It was a locum shift and she was happy to take the enhanced money. She falsified medical records and then continued to lie. I think she's got off quite lightly.

ShesTheAlbatross · 31/12/2025 09:27

There as no patient detriment

Thats not really true though. Patients who needed appointments couldn’t get them because she put made up ones in her calendar.
And she falsified the medical records of the people she said she was seeing

TheKeatingFive · 31/12/2025 09:27

As it was a locum shift, it's fraud, plain and simple. No sympathy at all.

Simonjt · 31/12/2025 09:27

DontFallInTheHaHa · 31/12/2025 09:25

YANBU.

Why was she put in a situation where she was so worried that her kids would be left in an empty school? And what made her resort to lying about it? I can’t imagine she jumped straight to lying, I think it’s likely it spiralled into lying because she had no other choice. Sounds like a very harmful and toxic cultures whereby workers weren’t allowed a work/life balance and women had to pretend they don’t have children.

Now there’s 1 less practicing GP, and who does that help? There are GPs making actual medical mistakes still prat king but a woman is sacked because gasp she prioritised her children.

It actually uncovers alarming misogyny IMO. I hope all the female GPs are ok

If a GP isn’t capable of arranging childcare for the additional shift she chose to book then I wouldn’t want them to be in anyway responsible for my health care if such a task is too challening foe them.

roseteapot · 31/12/2025 09:28

ilovesooty · 31/12/2025 09:26

It was a locum shift and she was happy to take the enhanced money. She falsified medical records and then continued to lie. I think she's got off quite lightly.

Exactly- all this sympathy for someone who deliberately took extra shifts and the extra money and then left early and faked medical records. I wonder how those people would feel if it their child's or their parent's medical records had been falsified

ShesTheAlbatross · 31/12/2025 09:28

brennanbones · 31/12/2025 09:26

She added patients she had already seen

Show quote history

No, they were patients she’d had phone appointments with, and she added a face to face appointment. I assume that’s the way appointments can be added without going through the receptionists - the dr saying “you need to be seen face to face, can you come at 4:30” during a phone appointment.

Makemineacosmo · 31/12/2025 09:28

No, I feel sorry for the millions of people who have to wait 4 weeks for an appointment.

This was extra locum work that she had agreed to do. She faced an issue that millions of us face every day, but she chose to lie both at the time and afterwards.

FrightfulNightfull · 31/12/2025 09:29

Dishonesty is one of the biggest no-nos in medicine.
Or put it another way - the GMC expects doctors to be held to a higher standard of accountability because of the standing they hold in society and the trust placed in them.

Doctors get struck off for many of the following- affairs with patients, drink-driving, domestic abuse, financial dishonesty, dishonesty about shifts completed, sexual assault, rape, getting a patient’s phone number from medical records to ask them out …
Doctors have to Tribunal for falling asleep on shift, leaving a shift to get a take-away, using someone else’s Oyster card, punching a patient in the face, doing shifts at two separate locations (back to back) without approval , submitting for extra shifts..

This woman knew full well the standards she was to uphold. No wonder the GMC wanted her to be struck off.

I’m sure she had the intelligence and funds to arrange something else before falsifying medical records and lying to her employer.

Allswellthatendswelll · 31/12/2025 09:29

I'm not condoning lying but if her kids nursery finished at 6 (and they fine you loads) but she's not finishing at work until then how is she meant to fill the gap?

Miranda65 · 31/12/2025 09:29

No sympathy at all. She should pay for proper childcare.
I am very supportive of doctors, generally, but she us tarnishing her profession.

Makemineacosmo · 31/12/2025 09:30

roseteapot · 31/12/2025 09:28

Exactly- all this sympathy for someone who deliberately took extra shifts and the extra money and then left early and faked medical records. I wonder how those people would feel if it their child's or their parent's medical records had been falsified

Show quote history

Precisely. She lied, then continued to lie.

roseteapot · 31/12/2025 09:30

Allswellthatendswelll · 31/12/2025 09:29

I'm not condoning lying but if her kids nursery finished at 6 (and they fine you loads) but she's not finishing at work until then how is she meant to fill the gap?

Paying for child care, the same as the rest of us and on a GP salary that's easier for her than many others

ForMyNextTrickIWillMakeThisVodkaDisappear · 31/12/2025 09:30

I get why she did it but did she consider her colleagues when she did this, and think “if I’m not pulling my weight, they’re going to have to cover me and stretch themselves further to make up for it?” I think I know the answer.

DontFallInTheHaHa · 31/12/2025 09:30

And I’m not a GP but I did work for the NHS when my kids were little (I know GPs aren’t strictly NHS but it’s part of the same system and culture). Never have I worked for such a family UNfriendly place. They HATED if I needed to pick up a sick child from nursery. I once had to drop off my laptop back at the office as I job shared, after working away for the afternoon. I picked up DD from after school club on the way as it closed at 5pm (when my shift ended) and I’d have left her in an empty school otherwise. I then came into the office with her (she was 4 and the car park was miles away I couldn’t have left her alone) 20 minutes after my shift ended to make sure my job share had the laptop on our desk. I was in and out the office in 2 minutes, a few colleagues admired DD’s school uniform, very uneventful.

I got a bollocking the next Monday. I need to be better prepared I was told. And even though I ended up having to pick DD up because the meeting I was at overran, and I was given strict instructions to stay til the end, I shouldn’t have brought DD into the office.
When asked if I should have left her in an empty school or left her alone in a car in the pitch black at the age of 4, I was told not to be facetious.

And they wondered why I handed my notice in a week later. That’s not even that bad an example of how mothers are despised in the NHS IME

Simonjt · 31/12/2025 09:31

Allswellthatendswelll · 31/12/2025 09:29

I'm not condoning lying but if her kids nursery finished at 6 (and they fine you loads) but she's not finishing at work until then how is she meant to fill the gap?

With additional childcare, childcare that she will be using in her main job, unless she has been doing the same thing there as well. Is she wasn’t capable of doing that she has the choice not to take additonal locum shifts.

Sidebeforeself · 31/12/2025 09:31

Allswellthatendswelll · 31/12/2025 09:29

I'm not condoning lying but if her kids nursery finished at 6 (and they fine you loads) but she's not finishing at work until then how is she meant to fill the gap?

Like every other working parent.

MolkosTeenageAngst · 31/12/2025 09:31

She falsified records to make it look like a patient attended an appointment they didn’t attend. Would you want fake appointments on your record? Falsifying records is serious misconduct. I feel sorry that she’s had her face splashed all over the daily mail, but she’s to blame for the disciplinary action.

Makemineacosmo · 31/12/2025 09:32

Allswellthatendswelll · 31/12/2025 09:29

I'm not condoning lying but if her kids nursery finished at 6 (and they fine you loads) but she's not finishing at work until then how is she meant to fill the gap?

Not agree to take the extra, very well paid, shift? Make other arrangements for the collection of her children like millions of us do? At a push, be honest with her practice and say she has to leave by a certain time so that she is not being paid for that time?