What are the most common examples of GP negligence | Are you a victim?
Published - 21/09/2023
When visiting a General Practitioner, we expect a high standard of treatment and for a healthcare professional to uphold a duty of care. Unfortunately, there is always a possibility of a personal injury resulting from clinical negligence.
GP negligence is when your medical practitioner fails to uphold a duty of care, resulting in injury or loss. If you are a victim of GP malpractice, you could be eligible for GP negligence compensation. It is essential to identify GP negligence to get the resolution you deserve. Here, we discuss GP negligence and the most common examples.
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Learn the general definition of medical malpractice and how this relates to GPs.
Understand the difference between medical negligence cases and mistakes.
We discuss the most encountered medical negligence claims; learn how to identify negligent medical treatment.
Identify whether a medical professional has provided negligent treatment.
GP negligence claims can be complicated; seek legal advice from a medical negligence solicitor.
What is GP negligence?
GP negligence is when your general practitioner fails to provide an adequate standard of care including under the NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) guidelines. This broad definition covers many possibilities, including avoidable harm, loss, and additional injuries that wouldn’t have occurred if the GP had not acted negligently. These instances are often more complex than at first glance. The person at fault for a medical error may be unclear, or the mistake may not be known until much later. A solicitor with experience in medical negligence and personal injury cases could help you find clarity.
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What is classed as GP negligence?
There is a broad spectrum of possible errors or examples of malpractice which could emerge. For instance, your GP may not identify warning signs of cancer and refer you for further tests. Wrong medication may be prescribed causing you injury. General safety can also affect the quality of the treatment you receive. Your GP could fail to highlight the need for any follow-up appointments or provide inadequate information on how to arrange them. There are also issues relating to diagnosis or treatment that may come under the umbrella of GP negligence. Here are some more examples of GP malpractice.
Negligent misdiagnosis
A medical misdiagnosis could result in the worsening or persisting of your condition. If your GP missed key symptoms, you might have a valid medical negligence case. If your GP reached the wrong conclusion due to an inadequate examination or a failure to conduct basic tests, the GP had not taken every possible step to provide an accurate diagnosis. A negligent diagnosis could lead to prescription errors or failure to refer you promptly to the correct specialist.
Treatment negligence
Treatment complications can also contribute to your negligence compensation claim. They might give you medication errors, wrong prescriptions, or advice which isn’t appropriate for your medical condition. Sometimes treatment negligence can result from failure to acknowledge medical or family history; your GP could prescribe the medication you’re allergic to.
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What are the most common GP negligence claims?
It is impossible to cover all GP negligence claims, but here, we cover some common examples that could make a valid case if you were to involve experienced solicitors.
- Failure to act on unusual test results could lead to delays in referrals or treatment and even result in the patient not receiving crucial medications.
- Failure to diagnose a condition – missing key symptoms, not listening to the patient’s recount, or even a lack of expertise and medical knowledge could result in harm.
- A failure to arrange preliminary tests such as blood tests, scans or biopsies that would help to diagnose the condition.
- Failure to refer the patient to a specialist for further examination and treatment could result in delayed diagnosis, treatment and a potential worsening of the condition.
- Misinterpreting a patient’s test results could result in a missed or incorrect diagnosis.
Are you a victim of medical negligence?
If GP negligence has significantly impacted your life, such as delayed treatment, injury, or financial or psychological losses, you could be eligible for medical negligence compensation. Your case may also help prevent these errors from being made in the future
If you have experienced the following, you should reflect on whether you received negligent medical care from your GP:
- A condition persists or worsens after receiving the wrong medication or advice from your GP.
- You have been prescribed medication that (known to the GP) you are allergic to or experience significant side effects from.
- Your GP has disregarded or failed to record your account of symptoms, which contributes to a missed or late diagnosis, leading to injury or loss.
- You have been psychologically impacted by improper care from your GP, which affects your ability to work or has incurred additional treatment costs.
- You have suffered financial losses due to improper care from a GP. For example, you could not work due to delayed treatment or have spent time and money on incorrect treatments or visits to inappropriate medical specialists.
What are the next steps for a GP negligence claim?
You will need to provide evidence of the negligent treatment and that it has caused you a significant loss. Misdiagnosis of cancer medical records, wrong prescriptions, referrals or preliminary test arrangements can be traced. However, some clinical negligence cases can be more challenging to prove; for example, inadequate medical examinations may not be on record. On the other hand, you could be unaware of GP negligence, such as misinterpreted test results, until much later.
You need a specialist medical negligence solicitor.
How can medical negligence solicitors help?
As discussed, building a robust clinical negligence claim can be challenging. You will need help proving negligence and gathering the correct evidence and documents from the right people.
Furthermore, at Wake Smith, we have no-win, no-fee arrangement, which we will fully explain to you. We also offer free consultations to discuss your case in more detail.
Reach the resolution you deserve after dealing with GP malpractice