GPs’ ‘no confidence’ vote in GMC for striking off doctor over boy’s death
GP LeADeRS have declared they have no confidence in the General Medical Council following its decision to strike off a doctor whose mistakes resulted in a boy dying from sepsis.
Hadiza Bawa-Garba made a series of errors while looking after six-yearold Jack Adcock and she was convicted of manslaughter through gross negligence in 2015.
experts say that many of the errors were caused by ‘systemic failures’ in the running of her hospital, the Leicester Royal Infirmary.
The case has provoked an outcry among doctors worried about reporting their own mistakes for fear of suffering the same fate, prompting thousands to sign a petition.
Last night, doctors defied their union bosses to back a motion of no confidence in the GMC at an annual meeting of GP leaders in Liverpool.
They also called for the GP committee of their union, the British Medical Association, to demand a review by the parliamentary health select committee, Pulse magazine reported.
Dr Zoe Norris, a BMA subcommittee chairman, said: ‘GPs have lost all confidence in the ability of the GMC to be objective and to genuinely balance patient safety against the reality of being a doctor in the modern NHS.
‘When – after your 14-hour day in your eighth month of working, a partner down with sickness – with your list going up and up, when you make a mistake, are you confident that the GMC will be fair, objective and balanced in its investigation of you?’
The doctors want to establish a system ‘whereby GPs can make collective statements of concern regarding unsafe care’. Jack died on February 18, 2011 – 11 hours after he was admitted to hospital.
Dr Bawa- Garba had just returned from 13 months of maternity leave and was covering the roles of three doctors and looking after patients on six wards. The trainee paediatrician’s errors included wrongly diagnosing Jack with gastroenteritis.
Midway through her shift, the hospital experienced an IT failure which meant she had to take down vital blood test results over the phone rather than seeing them on the screen.
When Jack suffered a septic shock, leading to a call for doctors to try to revive him, he was mixed up with a discharged patient who had a ‘do not resuscitate’ instruction on his notes.
Dr Bawa-Garba was given a 12month suspension by the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service but the GMC went to the High Court to overturn this and she was struck off in January.
Last month, Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt ordered an urgent review of how doctors are disciplined by the GMC when patients die due to their mistakes. The fear was of affecting patient safety by making doctors less likely to report errors.
Yesterday’s vote comes despite warnings from BMA GPs that it could harm the union’s relationship with the regulator.
Dr Richard Vautrey, the BMA’s GP committee chairman, said: ‘This motion is further evidence that the medical profession as a whole has been rocked by this case, in which a young boy tragically lost his life and a doctor lost their career.
‘As the GMC has acknowledged, this case has caused a great deal of anxiety among the profession.
‘We need a system that seeks not to scapegoat individuals, but recognises when workplace pressures have placed doctors in dangerous situations and commits to taking action to stop it happening again.
‘We have already secured a commitment from the GMC that it will never ask a doctor to provide reflections during investigations, and we are continuing to apply pressure to ensure it works to improve the system so that doctors of all grades can raise safety concerns while working in an overstretched environment.’