Advice on taking gp/hv to court

[Random92]

I'm new here, so not sure if I'm in the right spot.

Sorry in advance for the long post.

I'm looking for advice in trying to take my son's health visitor and GP to court for malpractice/negligence.

So to start, my partner took my son to the gp to the doctors for his 12 week injections today (which were late as they forgot to update our address after we moved, yes we informed them of the change)

While there, my partner informed them of a mark on his check that looks very much like a spot. We felt the need to mention this as he has a large strawberry birthmark on his head which started of similar to this (just to note, we had previously asked to see a specialist regarding this as we are very concerned as it looks almost ready to pop some days!)

After my partner pointed this out, as they hadn't noticed. They called in the health visitor and the gp who claimed it was a bruise. (What idiot confuses a fatty lump for a bruise and somehow is medically qualified?) As a result they got social services involved, and would not let my partner leave the doctors or the police would be called. (Just to note, preparations were only made to be out of the house for an hour, so no spare clothes, no extra bottles, no extras of anything.)

So roll on to 4 hours later, partner still held at the doctors, the social worker turns up as she has to drive my partner to the hospital for the little one to be examined. Where the specialist took one look at the baby and said it was a medical issue (fatty necrosis I believe?) not a bruise or anything inflicted by outside actions.

Now, this paediatrician noticed this was not a bruise within seconds, surely any half qualified health visitor or gp should've spotted that before treating us as if we were criminals. Now even though we have been cleared as its nothing we could of caused, the social worker still wants to visit our 4yo daughter tomorrow for whatever stupid reason which to be quite honest I think is not necessary as the gp and health visitor were wrong.

As any parent can imagine, the whole situation has been incredibly stressful, especially to my partner who they kept locked up all day and she gets very emotional and loves our little ones more than anything.
I feel we were treated as guilty until proven innocent and this should've of never been necessary if any half competent medical professional had checked the spot on our sons face in the first place. In total they kept our boy out of the house for 8 hours. We were lucky to have family that could collect our daughter from school.

Any advice on how to take this further would be greatly appreciated, as this is a permanent mark on our children's names, even though we did absolutely nothing wrong.

This has shattered any trust we have in our Heath care system, and has made me fearful of taking my own children to the doctors. We pointed out the mark! It would've went unnoticed otherwise!
I consider this a complete failure on the nhs and their procedures.

Signed, an upset father with a devastated partner.

Short version: health visitor called social services due to a medical issue, not an injury that anyone with eyes could see. Permanent mark on children's record.

You need to contact Pals in the first instance. They will then be able to escalate as needed. In my experience pals take down the information from your point of view and then send this to the appropriate manager whom then will contact you to discuss what you want the outcome of the complaint to be they will then investigate (there are time frames which you will be told about).
If you want specific things looked at or have particular questions answered tell pals as then this will form part of the investigation.

This would never make it to court. You could complain to the pratice manager and ask them to look into it. No actual harm has come to your child - not entirely sure what you would be suing for?

This is not a legal case

However you should escalate it at the GP’s practice

Any mark is investigated by a paediatrician- health visitors are not trained to diagnose different types of marks on a baby. Some babies have undiagnosed medical conditions which cause bruises, sometimes it’s a Mongolian blue spot, sometimes it’s a bruise caused by the actions of a parent. In most cases the paediatrician makes a quick diagnosis that it is not a non accidental injury and all parties can go home. However, the odd NAI is picked up and this can sometimes save that child’s life. If not it ends up in the paper and social services gets a roasting for negligence.
I understand how stressful this must have been for you, but it’s certainly not a legal case and happens all the time.
I would be pissed off, however, that a social worker is coming to visit your other child now that this mark has been identified as medical. There is absolutely no reason for this visit? I’d be asking for some clarity as to what exactly they were visiting for!

What do you want to achieve?

The GP saw something that concerned him and followed protocol and reported it.
GPs and the surgery staff have better things to be doing with their time than holding patients and their mothers hostage for no reason at all.
I can see why it was a distressing experience for all of you, but the medical staff really have no choice if they have identified concerns.
It would be negligence if they didn't do something about it. I'm a health professional, although not a GP and it takes bloody hours to complete safeguarding paperwork, it's not something I would just do on a whim.

My issue is, it took literally seconds to identify it as not being a bruise, anyone with half a brain could FEEL it was not a bruise. They would've completely missed it if we hadn't pointed it out through our own concern.

The reason I want to go further with this is due to the fact it's permanently a mark on our children's records. Also it caused a ridiculous amount of stress and the worker hasn't even been out to devour second child (for whatever idiotic reason they have) yet!

The whole procedure is backwards, send us to a paediatrician before getting social services involved!

Just to add to a list of things:
Our doctors forgot to change our address on the system after we contacted them about it.
This resulted in them sending our sons hospital appointment for his 12week injections late.
They messed up his injections and couldn't tell how much he had so now needs a repeat of them.
They cancelled a referral to to a paediatrician over the birthmark on our sons head. (The paediatrician yesterday said he should've been referred as they like to monitor the growth.)
The health
If they had referred us to a specialist in the first place(as we had requested multiple times) then this wouldn't of happened as these fatty lumps under the skin can be as a result of the birth mark spreading.

I'm not willing to simply let this go over the fact that it makes innocent parents seem like criminals. While the real dangers to children are the ones that aren't turning up at these appointments, or aren't showing any concern for their children.

Also, again the mark on his cheek could be in no way caused by any outside factors. They should of picked up on this at the GP.

They are doing their job, as pp said a mark on a child under one (or isn’t mobile yet) that could potentially be a bruise will be investigated - always. It’s to keep children safe and although an inconvenience to you I’m not sure it would get to court.

You can also just change gp practice if you aren’t happy.

It sounds like a really tough day! For your son, you and your partner.

I think some of the comments you're getting is because there was no loss or harm to your child. Legal action would be extremely costly and based on the events above, I imagine you'd be unlikely to have enough for a case.

It should definitely be raised as you say. I'd put a complaint in with the Practice Manager and consider moving GPs. The issue here was the GP who misdiagnosed it as a bruise not the whole healthcare system (the hospital got it right really quickly you suggest). Plus, social services have done the right thing from their end - why wouldn't they believe the GP? Again, I think your problem sits solidly with the GP not anyone else in this scenario.

Good luck!

Try to look at it from the angle that they had your child's best interests at heart. And as a society we're always grateful for that.

You're in shock and you're upset. Don't rush any decision. Glad lo is OK.

*worker hasn't even been out to devour second child"

I'm fairly sure you cant take them to court, they didnt actually do anything criminal.

In medical issues the first port of call is to complain to the practice manager at the GP listing the issues. Then if you really really arent happy you can report the GP and HV to their professional bodies (which will likely ruin their careers or at best cause a few years of significant stress. So please think carefully)

With anything to do with babies health professionals can be so over cautious. But with their job potentially on the line over missing something, can you blame them?

I'm sorry you were both stressed out about this but I cant help but feel you're being a bit dramatic. Nothing you've said strikes me as being really serious. If you're unhappy then switch GP practice.

You were treated very badly, that must have been a very shocking experience for you all. Injustice is always very difficult to deal with and I’m not surprised you feel the way you do.

Look up the complaints procedure for your GP surgery and put your complaint in writing following their process. It is completely valid.

Phone up the social services lady and ask her what the purpose of her visit is. Sometimes you just have to deal patiently with the box tickers once they are involved.

It sucks you went through this. Change GP if that’s feasible or you will always feel angry when you have to use them.

Sorry but this is never going to make it to court. I'm not even sure on what grounds it would be. As they don't seem to have acted illegally then it would be a civil issue. It seems the issue was an error on the GPs part. But they have to be better safe than sorry with potential harm. Most you'll get is an apology form the GP.

I’m a GP, I’m sorry you had to go thru that but it sounds like your Gp did exactly the right thing, and it’s something I’ve had to do in the past. It’s never nice but we have to put the child first, not you. Obviously without seeing the mark I can’t say exactly, but equally if it was fat necrosis it isn’t something very ‘common’ to newborns either so I don’t think it’s a matter of the Gp being ‘stupid’. If there is ANY doubt, I would refer straight to paediatrics.

For reference, last year I had a similar situation. Didn’t know what the lump was, referred in. Parents were furious whilst they waited but turned out to be a rare blood disorder, which required emergency treatment. So we do this for a reason.

Just to clarify, my problem isn't with the social worker. They get called, they have to turn up it's as straight forward as that.

My issue still stands at the GP should of easily been able to identify the lump as not being a bruise. So social should've never been contacted in the first place if the GP was even slightly competent at their job.

Did they have our child's beat interests at heard when they wouldn't let my partner leave to get him a bottle? (Which they couldn't provide so I had to drive a great distance and time from work to go get him one?) Or did they have our child's best interest at heart when we couldn't arrange anyone to pick up our daughter from school?
Was it fair of then to make my partner sit in the waiting area of the GP whilst crying in front of everyone there?

It's no longer a case of being upset, I'm absolutely livid in regards to what they put us through. I've been through stress in my life but nothing has ever come close to this.

They shouldn't be able to put people through this kind of emotional stress without good grounds! Pediatrician should be involved before any social workers! Especially if the GP is too idiotic to identify a fatty lump from a bruise!

Misdiagnosis is considered Medical negligence. This is a drastic misdiagnosis as far as I'm concerned.

I appreciate that it's not common in newborns, but it is more common when they have a birthmark like our little one has. If they had referred us as they should have in the first place, this would've never come about.

We actually went to the GP to be referred, they agreed to it. After my partner had got home, they (the GP) phoned her to say they had cancelled the referral!

Misdiagnosis is considered Medical negligence

Nope, not gonna fly. Not when a second opinion by a specialist happened the same day as a result of this. Its the exact opposite of negligence. Negligence would be thinking it was a bruise and letting the child home.

Move GPs by all means. But legally you don't have a leg to stand on with the mark in the cheek.

They were just doing their job. I understand though that you are upset by this.
Some years ago my teenage son came home with an injured thumb that he said he had hurt falling off of his bike. We went to A&E and it was fractured but the Doctor there flagged concerns because how ds explained it had happened wasn't consistent with the injury he had.
It later transpired that ds had fractured his thumb when messing about wrestling with his mate and lied so that I wouldn't be mad at his mate.
It was embarrassing and worrying to be suspected of injuring my child but it wasn't the Dr's fault he was just raising concerns as your GP was.

This has literally terrified us at the thought of taking our children to visit the GP. So that is in no way protecting children!

I have already swapped everyone out of the GP but I'm still not going to use the GP due to fear alone after this, I've only swapped out of principle and in case of sure emergency as I will not let any harm come to my kids!

This entire system is completely flawed and criminalizes the good parent while the bad parent are the ones who don't take their kids to the GP over concerns!

Also, surely as this was a non issue. There shouldn't be any records held against us on it.

Sorry for the multiple posts.

It feels awful to be treated in such a way but they really are just doing their job.

Parents who are negligent will actually turn up to an appointment and blame injuries on falling down the stairs. Or walking into a door. They can be quite convincing.

When DS was about 6 months old he fell off the bed. A common occurrence. His rib also stuck out weirdly which I had wanted to get checked out.

The consultant at the hospital signed us off and said it was congenital and she was happy there were no safeguarding issues. But we had been put through alot of appointments which were demanded by the HVs and it felt like we were being treated like abusers.

It felt awful but they were just doing their job. It has made me reluctant to go to hospital, I have to admit. But I would never put that above DS's need obviously.

Theres no point in complaining. They're trying to keep kids safe. However, I do find it a bit odd that they made you wait for a social worker and she drove you to the hospital. Perhaps you can complain to the practice manager about their procedure in this instance.

All you can do is complain and/or change GP. This wouldn't meet the criteria for court.

I disagree completely about being able to identify a bruise vs fat necrosis. Yes obviously I know the difference, but in a non mobile baby there is no way in hell I would take that risk. I would refer that in as ?non accidental injury every time. This isn’t misdiagnosis or medical negligence, and your GP isn’t an idiot. They did the right course of clinical action.

But obviously it was very upsetting and stressful and I’m sure if you complain they will apologise for that part. However, yes, it is standard protocol at many places to not let the parents leave (for bottles etc). Again, because in some cases, parents leave as the are scared to get caught, and the abuse continues. Sorry you had to go through this, but there is a safety reason behind the way you were treated.

You've had lots of advice, and I approximate that not all of it is what you want to hear. I still think that you need to calm down before you make any decisions at all. Because the way you're posting here, you sound so angry that you're much more easily dismissed as overreacting. Do you see that?

I'd be annoyed too at the bottle thing, and how I'd been treated but they definitely did have your baby's best interests at heart. If she was being abused, they and you would want to know, surely?