Why Do Patients Complain?
Many doctors can experience a grievance, investigation or clinical negligence claim throughout their medical career; a number of these might return from a patient, Associate in Nursing leader or via the General Medical Council (GMC) and will relate to any side of skilled follow. Complaints against doctors have sadly become additional common within the GB in recent years. This can be seemingly thanks to the increasing complexities of medication Associate in Nursing, a rising complaints culture amongst the final public, instead of any decrease in doctors’ performance.
Patients will build a grievance regarding any side of the medical aid they receive. Some common reasons for patient complaints include:
- Incorrect, incomprehensible or delayed identification
- Delayed treatment
- Post-surgery complications
- Poor rationalization of their choices
- Inappropriate conduct or behaviour of the doctor
- Lack of consent (or capability to consent)
- Breach of patient confidentiality
- The list isn’t thoroughgoing – there are several samples of what will fail in a very clinical setting. Doctors are, after all, solely human and errors will occur despite their best efforts, significantly after they are operating stressed in a very nerve-wracking setting.
What will happen following a complaint?
A patient grievance, or clinical incident involving a patient, will cause many various kinds of investigation, such as the following:
- Disciplinary action by the leader.
- Negligence claim (for money compensation).
- Complaint processed through the NHS grievances procedure.
- Hospital enquiry.
- An enquiry or, in a European country, procurator commercial enterprise enquiry if a patient has died.
- GMC investigation.
- Criminal investigation.
Misconduct on social media
- Clinical mistakes, or poor communication, once operating with patients
- Accusations of poor follow throughout Associate in Nursing elective
What risks may I face as a junior doctor?
Once you qualify, you face multiple activity risks that would sadly have grave consequences for your career, name and finances.
Above, we tend to line a number of the most reasons why patients complain and also the numerous consequences that may arise from a grievance. However, the precise risks may rely on what form of doctor you become. as an example, can you be designated patients, treating patients, or a mix of both?
How am I able to avoid patient complaints and different aggregation problems? The answer to this is that “prevention is healthier than cure”. It is a well-known phrase in medicine and it’s conjointly true wherever aggregation problems are involved.
Most patient complaints relate to at least one or additional of the subsequent areas:
- Competence
- Communication
- Consent
- Confidentiality
- Conduct
Being aware and having experienced potential risks can have a positive impact on your behaviour and clinical performance. Here are our suggestions:
Stay up to date with the latest developments
Keep abreast of the newest developments in health care, such as news, policy announcements and necessary changes to laws and legislation.
Work on your ‘soft’ skills
Do you communicate effectively? Patients can sometimes appreciate honest, open doctors WHO communicate effectively, justify problems clearly and apologize fittingly once things don’t get set up. It’s conjointly key that you just communicate clearly and absolutely with colleagues in the least levels.
Learn from others’ mistakes
Many doctors have found themselves in difficult situations; learn from them so you don’t find yourself within the same position.
Take online courses
Medical school doesn’t cowl everything. If time permits, take extra on-line courses.
Helping members to avoid issues before they happen is central to our approach, therefore, we offer a good vary of instructional resources and workshops covering areas, such as:
- Medicolegal problems
- Professionalism course for doctors
- Ethics course for doctors
- Communication and social skills
- Systems and processes
- Clinical risk management
- Probity course for doctors
What if I make a mistake?
Sometimes interference isn’t enough and even the simplest. Most diligent doctors realize themselves facing complaints and legal proceedings. At this stage, there are still steps you’ll need to take in order to protect yourself.
Recognize and report early
Contact your medical defence organization as shortly as attainable.
Rectify the error and stop additional damage
Take responsibility for what’s happened and do what you’ll to rectify the case. You can’t undo the error entirely, however, you will be ready to stop the patient from returning to any extent further damage.
Learn from mistakes
Resilience and continuous developments are half and parcel of being an excellent doctor. Use negative experiences as learning opportunities and take steps to make sure identical errors aren’t created once more.
Receiving a grievance or claim is implausibly troublesome for any health care provider. It boards inevitable emotional stress and doctors might find themselves facing money penalties, reputational harm and doubtless withdrawal of their right to practise medicine.
We conjointly facilitate all our members proactively cut back their risk of facing aggregation problems by giving them access to a good variety of instructional resources like articles, case studies, events and webinars.