To make a complaint about very senior spine consultant

[Bdds6998]

I'm in my late 30s. Loads of issues with my knees and numerous surgeries. I also have scoliosis. Over years the knee issues have really affecting my back. I'd been managing fine (lost a little weight, pilates, lots of walking) until I started having kids. I got a really bad episode of sciatica in my last pregnancy and ended up in A&E after my osteopath sent me there suspecting cauda equina. Thankfully it was just a couple of disc bulges and annular tears and I was able to get back onto my feet after a couple of weeks.

I've put on about 10kg since my pregnancies (BMI 26.5). I'm still walking loads (I don't drive) and working part time. I am a single parent to two toddlers, one of whom has additional needs. I ended up getting referred (on the NHS) to see a very very senior spine consultant at a private hospital. Anyway, he arranged an MRI and I had my follow up this week. Coincidentally, I've had a really bad case of sciata this week so was glad to be seeing him for a discussion about my MRI results. His clinic was running 30mins behind. When he called me in, he didn't actually look at me walking towards his room (I was limping). He also didn't notice my discomfort while sitting or my altered gait. I was out of the room within 60 seconds. He just told me my scans were fine, I needed to lose weight, he joked about sending me to bootcamp and throwing away the key, sorting out my diet. He suggested I walk more. He doesn't know I am a single parent, that I don't drive so walk a lot, that I have a child with additional needs. I am also awaiting knee surgery which I mentioned but he didn't seem bothered about that. He suggested both times I saw him that I should be attending with my husband without even establishing I was married/had a partner.

I am visibly Muslim woman. I am also a postgraduate professional working in healthcare. I find his manner with me so poor. He was dismissive, seemed to hold many unconscious biases. His clinical opinion aside (which I am definitely not challenging as a consultant of his experience), would IBU to make a complaint about the consultation?

Thanks!

A BMI of 26.5 is just into overweight and certainly not the main cause of your issues. Make a complaint about his attitude and ask to see a different surgeon.

@Bdds6998 i'm really sorry you had that experience

Being a woman is bad enough when you're facing a doctor but being overweight is even more problematic

I think he should've paid more attention to your knee surgery. That will change your gait, having a knee problem. That intern will affect your back.

I've had a couple of problems, including a spinal injury and I had to go and get physio privately. Physio was really, really helpful.

I think sometimes now the NHS will refer you on for physio that's essentially an online learning programme - could you ask for that? I've recently been told by someone who had surgery that the surgeon after-care just shrugged his shoulders about physio and thought it wasn't important. I have found it really helpful twice. I would say I would not have recovered properly without it.

My late father had problems with spontaneous fractures and to be honest, he went to physio because I told him to! He came away from it saying he was really surprised how helpful it was

Unfortunately, you can't now assume that a doctor or a specialist is going to give you good advice. I am neither. But if you can get something like that I think it would be important, especially as you've got this other surgery to think about

Good luck to you - no idea whether it's worth making a complaint or not because I never have - I get the impression that complaints procedure is designed to cause maximum stress.

Why didn’t you challenge there and explain the difficulties you’ve said here?

Possibly because when you're in pain, vulnerable and expecting to see someone who is meant to try and understand what's going on, and help you, you shouldn't have to stick up for yourself?

We've all been in positions where we wish we'd said something different at the time. Comments like this are not helpful to the OP.

As harsh as it sounds this is the reality of dealing with the nhs.

Complain and suggest he attends weight discrimination training - my friend runs training on this for health professionals, the level and prevalence of unconscious bias she runs into are startling.

Why on earth does he think a grown woman needs to be seen with her husband?!

How is 26.9 high? FFS!

As i said in my post I have no idea about BMI so going on the suggestion she needs to loose weight i wondered if it was the case. If igs not even more of a reason to complain.

Well of course you can complain if you wish but to be honest, I see little point. Nothing will happen if he is as senior as you say he is and the NHS paid for you to see him in his private clinic.

Senior consultants are known to be very brusque to say the least. DH is being seen by one of the top knee consultants in the country and DH says he’s a dick but he’s the best so what can you do? 🤷‍♀️

Yes of course you can complain. Who cares if he is very senior.

Could you try the following…

ask to be referred to a different spine consultant
also request a referral to a physiotherapist
make a real effort to lose some weight
try to get as fit as possible within the limitations of your physical impairments, e.g. gentle yoga or Lucy Wyndham Read’s short workouts

There are two physiotherapists on YouTube that I have found really useful:
Dr Jo
Will Harlow

You do realise that advocating for yourself is about not giving up. You sit there until you get what you want.

PMSL at 'a BMI of 26.5 is 'quite high.' No wonder so many people have eating disorders when people come out with nonsense like this!

@Bdds6998 Yes you should complain. He was horribly unprofessional. Consultants are not known for their nice bedside manner though. I have a friend who didn't want things shoving up her arse and down her throat when she was diagnosed with coeliac disease (for personal reasons and previous trauma,) and the consultant said 'the consultation is over then' and showed her the door. He didn't offer her any further help, or an alternative. A lot of medical consultants are very arrogant. They could do with more people complaining about them, to bring them down a peg or two.

Yeah, I have seen consultants (and so has DH) a number of times over the past 10-15 years, and 90% of the time we get called in at least 30 minutes after the appointment time. And they NEVER apologise.

The last one I went to last year was an HOUR and 10 minutes late. My appointment was 2pm and I got called in at 3.10pm. I was fucking fuming. It was boiling hot in the waiting room, they had said he was running 'relatively on time' when I asked when I checked in, and there seemed to be NO reason for me to have been kept waiting.

I asked the receptionist a couple of times (after 30 minutes, and then again after an hour,) what was going on and if I had been forgotten. She said 'oh he'll call you in soon, some patients just take a bit longer than others, he has probably got a difficult case in with him.'

I knew that was actual complete bollocks, because his 1.30pm appointment was called in at 2.15pm (because I was talking to them and they were complaining their appointment was running late too when I arrived at 1.55pm,) and they left at 2.25pm! I watched them come out. So I should have been called in by 2.30-2.35pm at the latest. Yet I got called in at 3.10pm. What the fucking hell was he doing for that 40 minutes?! I bet if I was even 5 minutes late he would refuse to see me.

Oh and yeah, I was in with him for about THREE minutes. Barely examined me, didn't ask questions, and didn't even make eye contact with me. He's probably on £200K a year for his less-than-average, 'expertise' and 'skills....'

It’s at least a stone over the healthy weight range. So yes, it’s quite high!

It's really NOT 'quite high.' 🙄 And a number of posters have said this. As I said, no wonder so many people have eating disorders when people come out with nonsense like this.

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I would suggest putting everything you've said here into an email and sending it to PALS at the hospital.

I have done this a couple of times (to help future patients rather than myself) and it's been effective.

One time they ordered the clinic to send someone to Poundstretcher to get a whiteboard so they could communicate approx waiting times to patients. I was there 5 hours worrying about the gradually dehydrating and confused elderly woman I could see!

The consultant wouldn’t have mentioned to lose weight if it was a healthy weight / bmi. Anything over a 25 bmi is overweight and therefore an unhealthy weight and therefore quite a high bmi.

Absolute horse shit.

A BMI of over 30 could reasonably considered quite high.

This woman has about 8lbs to go to be a healthy weight. That's about the volume and weight of 8 cans of diet coke. Hardly life changing.

She said she had 10kg to lose, that’s 22lb.

A bmi of 25-29 is overweight.
A bmi of 30 is obese.

Actually, OP states she is 80kg at 175cm tall. A loss of 3.5kg puts her bmi back to below 25.

A loss of 3.5kg is 7.7lbs.

I think part of the problem is that patients wait so long to see a consultant and think they are the holy grail to resolving their pain , illness etc that to be dismissed so quickly with no clear way forward other than lose weight is devastating. I do think some consultants just have a shockingly bad lack of empathy and acknowledgement of what a patient is suffering. Would I complain , no I wouldn’t , I would imagine the governing body is only interested in clinical care not bedside manner .

Definitely complain if he’s making weird comments about your husband. Especially if you suspect that’s because you’re Muslim.

Although OP if you are South Asian or black African please note that the BMI bands for you are different and BMI 26.5 places you in the obese Class I category.

BMI bands for South Asian, Chinese, other Asian, black African, black Caribbean, Middle Eastern = 23.5 (overweight) and 25 (obese).