Significant Event

[pebblesparker]

Long post so please bear with me.
My 16yr old DD has been going to the doctors since Aug 2017 for various symptoms including fatigue, muscle ache sore joints, pins & needles in hands and feet to name a few. I have 4 brothers and 4 sisters and as Autoimmune conditions have been found in 5 of us, the GP tested for a variety of things RA, Lupus, Coeliac and a raft of others. Apparently her TSH came back borderline and we were advised to wait 3 months to have this retested. In the meantime symptoms persisted. In Sept she was told that her BMI of 26 showed that she was overweight and needed to eat more healthily. Her TSH was again tested in Jan and was again borderline. She has been put on Folic acid and iron tablets and was told in Feb that her T3 & T4 levels were fine. She became more and more despondent and began to think it was all in her head. The situation was made worse by the fact that the surgery would only discuss her results over the phone with her not me due to her age. 3 weeks ago she became excessively thirsty, had an increase in urination and I noticed she was losing weight. We managed to see a locum GP who sent her for blood test for kidney function and diabetes. On 29th March we were called in to the surgery and told that she had Type 1 diabetes. Her level were so high at the time that we had to go straight to A&E and she had a 3 night stay in hospital. All very traumatic and distressing.
Whilst collecting her prescription from the surgery we were called in to speak to a long term locum, who advised that he advised that she had seen a total of 6 GP's ,most of them locums and that he felt her treatment had been poor. He considered this a "Significant Event" and advised that we should take the matter further.
We have had exemplary treatment from the hospital and diabetic team. I honestly can't fault them. Whilst I am aware of the strain that GP's are under and don't want to point the finger of blame at anyone, I think a lesson can be learned from this.
Does anyone have any experience of how a Significant Event is handled and what outcome we should expect?

Thank you for being patient with such a long post.

Wow! I wonder who runs the practice. If a long term locum has said that to you it sounds like it isn't a typical GP practice (partners who run the business) but must be staffed by irregular locums.
Type 1 diabetes comes on really quickly and whilst something may have been brewing in the background I can't see anything in the history you have given here that I would have issues with. I'd also be highly annoyed if someone said that to a patient of mine without bringing it up with me face to face.
In GP land if something happens we do what is called a SEA.(Significant Event Analysis) to see where something may have gone wrong and make changes.
If your daughter is ok now then I'm not sure what you would have to gain from persuing this further. Unless there was an actual delay getting the blood sugar results to you at the end.
If this were the situation (sorry I'm rambling) I wonder if the GP in question is wanting a complaint put in as he/she is trying to run the practice without enough help and needs it as proof that the surgery is running dangerously. There are surgeries where there is no cohesive workforce and noone available to read results for days. It is a terrifying fact just now but GP is crumbling.

Sorry another question. How long was it between taking that final blood and being called in on the 29th? This is probably the crucial bit

Thanks for you reply.
To be fair they did call us in as soon as the blood tests were received. We were asked to attend the surgery yesterday when one of the partners explained the locum had raised it with her. She explained that she had looked at the history and would be raising it as an issue at the next meeting to see what lessons could be learned. She will let us know their findings.
I know that the practice is largely staffed by locums both long and short term, as they struggle to find full time GP's, ( I am guessing this is a nationwide problem).
I am happy that they are willing to accept that there be things that they can improve on and will await their findings.