Good Medical Practice 2024: What Changed and What Every Doctor Must Know

The Four Domains of Good Medical Practice 2024

Good Medical Practice 2024 is organised around four domains that together define what it means to be a competent, professional, and trustworthy doctor:

You must develop and maintain your professional performance by applying knowledge and experience to practice, keeping your professional knowledge and skills up to date, and recognising and working within the limits of your competence. Good Medical Practice 2024 strengthens the expectation that doctors actively identify learning needs rather than passively completing CPD.

You must take prompt action if patient safety, dignity, or comfort is or may be seriously compromised. This domain covers risk management, incident reporting, the duty of candour, and contributing to systems that protect patients. The 2024 edition provides clearer guidance on what being open when things go wrong looks like in practice.

You must communicate effectively with patients and colleagues, work collaboratively in teams, and treat everyone with respect and dignity. Good Medical Practice 2024 significantly strengthens requirements around addressing discrimination, supporting colleagues to raise concerns, and behaving professionally on social media.

You must act with honesty and integrity, maintain appropriate boundaries, declare conflicts of interest, and behave in a way that justifies public trust. This domain covers probity, financial conduct, social media behaviour, and conduct outside clinical practice. Good Medical Practice 2024 makes explicit that doctors must not discriminate, bully, or harass anyone — including on social media.

What Changed in Good Medical Practice 2024

While the four domains remain the same structural framework, several significant changes were introduced:

• Doctor wellbeing — for the first time, Good Medical Practice 2024 explicitly acknowledges that doctors' own health and wellbeing affects patient safety. It encourages doctors to seek support and creates an expectation that working environments support doctors to practise safely
• Discrimination and bias — stronger and more explicit requirements to challenge discrimination, address bias in clinical decision-making, and treat colleagues fairly regardless of protected characteristics
• Social media — new guidance on the professional use of social media, including the expectation that doctors maintain professional standards in all online interactions
• Multidisciplinary teams — greater emphasis on working effectively in teams, respecting colleagues from different professions, and contributing to a supportive team environment
• Raising concerns — strengthened expectations around creating environments where colleagues feel safe to raise concerns, and supporting those who do
• Duty of candour — clearer guidance on being open with patients when things go wrong, aligned with the joint GMC/NMC duty of candour guidance
• Language and accessibility — the 2024 edition is written in clearer, more accessible language throughout, making it easier for doctors to understand and apply

Good Medical Practice 2024 and Fitness to Practise

Good Medical Practice 2024 is the single most important document in any GMC fitness to practise proceeding. When case examiners assess whether your conduct fell below expected standards, they compare it against the specific paragraphs of Good Medical Practice 2024. When an MPTS panel determines whether your fitness to practise is impaired, the benchmark is Good Medical Practice 2024.

If you are facing a GMC investigation or preparing for a hearing, you should:

1. Read Good Medical Practice 2024 in full — know which paragraphs are relevant to the concerns in your case
2. Reference it in your reflective statement — demonstrate that you understand which standards your conduct fell below and how you now meet them
3. Complete CPD aligned to it — courses in ethics, professionalism, and probity demonstrate engagement with the standards
4. Discuss it at your appraisal — show your appraiser that you understand the 2024 changes and how they apply to your practice

Good Medical Practice 2024 is not a document you read once and file away. It is the living standard against which your entire professional career is assessed. The doctors who know it best are the ones who navigate regulatory challenges most effectively.

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Practical Implications for Daily Practice

• Appraisal and revalidation — your appraisal should now explicitly reference Good Medical Practice 2024. Your appraiser will assess your practice against the updated domains
• Social media conduct — think carefully about every post. The 2024 standards make clear that unprofessional online behaviour can trigger fitness to practise proceedings
• Colleague relations — bullying, harassment, or discrimination towards colleagues is now more explicitly addressed as a professional standards issue
• Wellbeing — seeking help for your own health is not a weakness — it is a professional expectation. Good Medical Practice 2024 recognises this explicitly

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