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

This.

Lied. Left work earlier than supposed to and worse faked appointments.

So in short, you think intentionally falsifying medical records isn't that bad because she might have been negligent enough to enter the wrong information accidentally, and other medical professionals sometimes make genuine errors of judgement.

Either you do indeed not understand the severity of it, or you're just trying to save face.

Interesting article in the Guardian about male doctors not being struck off despite reports of sexual assault

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/sep/18/uk-doctors-guilty-of-sexual-misconduct-are-not-being-struck-off-research-finds

I think a last written warning would have been enough but have her name and face all over the press is just awful. She didn’t commit a huge crime. Yes I feel sorry for her and hope she and her family are ok.

She commited fraud in a highly regulated extremely professional job, in a sector where not a second of anything unprofessional should ever occur for a second.

Gener baiting whataboutism doesn't change anything.

Honestly I agree with you. I think the system sucks, but where she was in the wrong was falsifying records. As someone else has pointed out that could have led to patient harm if it had been incorrectly recorded that a patient had been seen face to face when they hadn't. If they had only been seen by telephone but their problem hadn't got better, another GP might have not advised them to come in if they incorrectly thought they had already been seen face to face, but they might have actually needed a face to face assessment which they hadn't yet had.

I don’t condone lying and I think another solution should have been found before it got to this stage.

But I do think the reporting on this has been appalling! It is like the people writing the article are stupid and don’t know the difference between the school run and after school pick up. She was leaving to make it for after school pick up and honestly what choice does any parent have with that?! In our after school club if we are late, for every minute after 6pm we are charged £5. This is to discourage parents from being delayed and to penalise parents. It always stresses me out when I am picking up after my office days on whether I will make it on time. I sometimes come back home by 5pm and work from there so as not to be delayed for the afterschool pick up. My manager is kind about that and allows flexibility.

I said I had no issue with her being struck off.

I made two points:

• One that her behaviour doesn't impact women in senior positions in the corporate world.
• Secondly, that male doctors do far worse things than this GP did yet are not struck off.

For example, last September a male doctor left mid-way through an operation to have sex with a nurse but is still allowed to practice:
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/sep/15/doctor-who-left-patient-during-operation-to-have-sex-allowed-to-practise

"Saving face on an anonymous forum"??? LMAO

Falsifying innocent patients’ records, lying about it repeatedly, blocking diary time when people are literally dying because of a lack of GP appointments. As a working mother I’m disgusted by her actions actually. No doubt there are people getting away with far worse but what she’s done is very wrong and deserves a proper sanction.

Re school holidays, I’d imagine GPs would need to try & get annual leave to cover some of the time, book the kids into holiday camps, possibly have family who can help out…a bit like the rest of us with jobs & young children

Yes very many GPs work part time and then work locum/extra sessions to help with cover at their own surgeries eg to help cover colleagues annual leave or sudden sickness or perhaps at another surgery on a regular basis

The GMC obviously agree with you which is why she has been suspended for a few months rather than being struck off. She will probably have to undergo some more retraining and can then resume her

I don't think we are stupid given we can see from the report that this was a shift she agreed she was not under pressure to take on, and she never mentioned to the partners, receptionist etc that there would be an issue with any appointments running after 4.45pm.
It's very different to her being contracted to work until 5 every day, then I'm sure she would have to have alternatives for childcare as faking appointments and subsequent reports every day would not be possible, she didn't have to do this

For the millionth time ...

She had the choice NOT to take on the locum shift that she didn't have childcare to cover.

I don't think it's the people writing the article that are being stupid here 🫠

Just like people supposedly have the choice not to work at all?? Were her working hours meant to continue beyond the childcare she had booked? I would assume a locum shift is offered for a set shift.
I undertake clinics and even if blocked out the last few appointments would still have worked my contracted finish hours by the time I left at the end of the day when you take account of arriving early, lunch breaks usually worked through and post clinic admin. Fortunately I’m contracted to finish at 5, the last appointment is scheduled to finish at 4.20 and my childcare finishes at 6 and is only 20 minutes away so it gives me a bit of leeway. I’ve changed childminders when they’ve changed their finish times to earlier as I just don’t want the stress.There are absolutely no childminders in our area of any other area we have lived in that finish after 6pm. I’m sure she would not have chosen to put herself under this stress if it were just a case of being able to book childcare until 6.30

You picked a poor example. In what way did the male doctor behave worse that the female GP. She lied and lied again falsified a legal document. He should have what he did but he didn’t at least hand over to a colleague and returned 8 mins later?

If you want to try and push the idea that women are treated worse than men you should at least find another case where a Dr lied and falsified medical records.

How about the case to the male GP Dr Siong Lee?

https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/gp-didnt-tell-patient-risk-31771781

She signed up for a locum shift that she didn't have childcare to cover. In order to square that circle (a problem entirely of her own making), she put in fraudulent appointments and falsified patients records.

And this is seriously something you're prepared to condone?

My understanding is that she did have childcare to cover the hours she was meant to work but not for the possibility that she might have to stay late, the system shouldn’t be structured in a way which makes that a likely possibility? She didn’t do the right thing in the way she tried to work around the issue and I think she understands that. However the practice should have worked with her to solve the problem or she should of ideally been able to say it’s really not going to work putting in appointments at 4.45 for me as I’m bound to be already running late by then and just not going to be able to give all the patients I’m seeing/contacting a decent standard of care, post clinic admin etc if you do that, but sadly it isn’t a culture that accepts someone saying that

Obviously not, if she felt the need to book out her last two slots of the day to give her the time to get her children.

In some jobs you can't guarantee that you'll leave on the dot of the hour. You need a degree of contingency in your childcare to cover that. This will not have come as any big surprise to a GP.

Have you not RTFT? She chose to take on extra sessions for extra money.

The Daily Mail are subject to the same libel laws as everyone else. If a person is named, they cannot legally make up stuff. They're fucked if they do. So the 'oh it's the Daily Mail lol hahahaha' really doesn't make sense.

I very much doubt there was an option to book a later finishing time for her childcare, if she was meant to finish in time to get her children it’s irrelevant she had booked a locum shift. By your reasoning many mothers wouldn’t work at all. My employer says they expect you to be able to sort out childcare for a sick child within 24 hours, I know there are occasions when that would not be possible and so far I’ve just been lucky but like many mothers I wouldn’t be working at all if I had all the contingencies in place that our employers expect us to have. In fact I almost didn’t take my position because of it but thankfully attitudes seemed to become more relaxed about time off during the pandemic and flexible
working in general and it seemed viable to pick up my professional career As it is I have never actually taken a day off in 5 years. Attitudes such as yours set women’s access to work and many careers back decades

They can make stuff up provided it is not defamatory or they think the person they are talking about won't sue them. In this case they haven't made anything up, but they have rather glossed over the fact that she put patient safety at risk by falsifying patient records.

No, it definitely isn't irrelevant that she booked a locum shift, because without that shift she would have had no problem picking up her children on time.

Attitudes such as yours set women’s access to work and many careers back decades

I have no words for how ridiculous this is. She committed fraud and falsified patient records. If you don't understand how serious that is, I can't help you.

The full judgement is available on the GMC site. No need for you to worry about silly women’s media literacy.

If anything the press coverage of the facts understated the case.