To feel very sorry for this doctor

[runningpram]

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

Do you think she'd be foolish enough to choose two mentally unwell patients though? Far more likely to choose two people who had something like a viral infecton surely?

where does it say that she was booked overtime and didn’t arrange childcare?

enlighten me and educate me on where it states this in the article because all I’ve read is she did this so her colleagues wouldn’t book things to impact her finishing at the time she was supposed to to get to school for 6pm which might I add what child should be at school till 6 from 8am anyway. The guilt this mother must have been feeling and also you make it sound like the child shouldn’t have been put first. You want to bet I’d make any excuse to go and collect my own child at a reasonable time if I had to albeit I’d just make it clear I can’t do xyz appointments at this time cause it would impact finishing to get MY CHILD from school

Conspired? The only person who did anything to get themselves in trouble is the GP who planned to set up false appointments, create fake medical notes and to skive off. If she hadn’t acted in what way, what trouble do you believe she would be in?

You may support people who choose to falsify medical notes and then lie about it when asked, but people with basic respect for a profession would distance themself from someone like that.

What? Why would they support her? She was committing fraud.

In many suicides the person avoids accessing MH support in the run up. Someone I know took their life this year. They had been to their GP a week before about a skin complaint which meant a full inquest was needed. It was an enormous shock to everyone but it does happen.

She should just have left on time, rather than falsified records.

What do you mean? She didn't enter data for the fake face to face on the files until a couple of days later when a partner in the surgery noticed discrepancies, I doubt she wrote the exact same info that she had written after the phone appointment, that would seem silly given she knew she was already under scrutiny. Im thinking she had to go back to enter the phone appointment data to say the patient required an urgent same day in person appointment, but regardless there are very strict rules re when a patient file can be opened nevermind adding false information to them. As others have said there is potential for consequences for those patients too, in the event of their needing an appointment soon after the fake one, travel insurance, or god forbid one die shortly after

She opted to do a locum shift, a shit she said she had no personal or professional reason to carry out, she knew her shift would end at pick up time and she didn’t arrange childcare that would bridge the gap between her locum shift ending and her getting to the childcare setting.

Wanting to collect your child is fine, we do that too, what we don’t do is skive or falsify legal documents to enable us to do it.

She only had the patients she'd had telephone appointments with that day to pick from, so presumably had a limited choice

She could have put her child first by not signing up for extra shifts that she didn't have childcare to cover.

This thread is utterly bizarre, the excuses people are making for this woman.

So you wouldn’t mind if your medical records were falsified then? Or if you needed an emergency appointment for up or child or your mother but there weren’t any because the doctor was lying and saying they were seeing patients.

She didn’t have to take the extra locum work. She has said that herself. She didn’t feel any pressure to take it but it’s well paid and if you aren’t going to actually do it…it’s money for old rope. Why don’t you send her the £160 an hour she was paid for saying she would work between 5pm and 6pm as overtime that she volunteered to do? Then she won’t have to lie.

Did you miss the bit where it says it was a locum shift she volunteered for, and presumably got paid extremely well for ?

She has falsified patient records, defrauded the NHS and taken money for time she has not worked and as tax payers we pay the price for this.
The NHS is very supportive in terms of reduced hours or flexible working, this should have been an option.

But she also lied! I do sympathise, it is so hard to juggle everything, especially as mother when you are the default carer, no matter how hard you try to split things. But you can't lie at work.

From the article OP shared,
'She had chosen that day to undertake additional locum session work, but she had not made an appropriate fallback provision for childcare.'

If it had been dealt with internally by the GP practice, I guess she'd have resigned and taken a post elsewhere with new employers blissfully unaware

I don't think that's good enough

@DBD1975 firstly she wouldn't have been employed by the NHS but by the GP practice who operate independently.

Secondly I'm not sure really what price tax payers paid here.

We are now paying a price of one less practising GP.

Of course it was wrong what she did, I just think on the face of it it seems disproportionate

Glad you are in fortunate position to be able to doubt it.

Edit: On the facts, if not white she would almost certainly have been permanently struck off.

The risk she was worried about was that the last few patients needed more time and potentially urgent care. They are going to have to find another service or not be seen at all. Urgent care or out of hours which might delay treatment. And that could cause harm. This is known risk she was trying to avoid. By effectively hiding behind a computer and not doing what she is professionally obliged to do.

yes she is a mother with a child. But the patient she ducked out of seeing could have been a mother with a sick child.

again if every HCP closes their doors early the demand goes elsewhere. Probably A&E putting those services under pressure and the staff there under strain. Which adds risk to whole system.

Even if the mother with the sick child walked through the clinic door on her last second of work she was professionally obliged to see them. Which is why she should not have voluntarily taken the shift.

I’m sure the calls she recorded as f2f were for low risk benign consultations. Nonetheless she was risking patient harm.

She falsely claimed to have examined one of the patients in person. In fact, they only spoke by phone. So if it was, say a breast lump, a subsequent clinician would think that on X date, the lump was examined in surgery. That could ne v serious

She had appropriate childcare that finished at 6. She didn’t have a fall back for if her shift actually ended an hour later at 5:45.
This job was her only one - this shift was an additional one she picked up but that doesn’t mean she shouldn’t be able to leave on time to pick up her children.
However you obviously absolutely cannot falsify records! She would have been better telling the staff not to book in someone for the last 2 appointments to give her time for overrunning. And if necessary just leaving early even if she hadn’t seen all her patients.

Any excuse? Then I sincerely hope you don’t work in a healthcare profession. ‘Cardiac surgery? I’d love to help but I’ve got a child to pick up’. A person in a responsible job should be able to arrange childcare and their time. She couldn’t, so how can she be trusted with patient care?

I think she's got off lightly but you have no way of knowing that she would have faced a permanent striking off had she not been white.

She falsely claimed to have examined one of the patients in person. In fact, they only spoke by phone. So if it was, say a breast lump, a subsequent clinician would think that on X date, the lump was examined in surgery. That could ne v serious

How’s trying not to be cynical working out for you?