Ward 87: General Medical Council. "It is run by amateurs rather than legal experts" Says Dr Wilmshurst

Saturday, 30 January 2010

General Medical Council. "It is run by amateurs rather than legal experts" Says Dr Wilmshurst

As expected, Dr Jane Barton was able to inject high levels of lethal cocktails and kill patients. The Daily Mail has the recent report. Anne Reeves and co are not happy. I don't blame them. They have worked tirelessly on this case and fought against the tide for years and years. The GMC have given them nothing.

Dr No has been covering this issue admirably in his latest post access here. He postulates on the General Medical Council and its intentions. I am very surprised that "other" medical bloggers have not even mentioned the Barton issue. Perhaps they all fear the Shipman hauntings thereby failing to understand that Shipman only ruined the medical profession because nothing was done about it early enough. It is important to rid the profession of its bad apples and it is vital to protect the public. The sooner doctors understand this, the more confidence the public will have in them. My fear is that the public will assume that all doctors are cowards and just as bad as Barton because they do not speak out. Jane Barton is a bad apple. For some reason, she has the establishment circling around her thereby protecting her from people like us - those who apparently don't understand her way of medicine. The fact is people happily die without large eye boggling amounts of pain relief. Isn't that amazing?! Personally, I have never seen those kind of cocktails being used on anyone.

On the other side of the fence, numerous doctors have written to me asking why the GMC have chased after them despite a lack of patient concerns. Of course, this is an age where whistleblowers are assassinated and killers are allowed back into the medical profession.

I have accepted this because I know the profession very well and I have seen killers kill patients and be allowed to work. Afterall, the senior doctors responsible for Ward 87 were allowed to continue in their jobs. I knew many years ago where the buck stopped. The buck stops with the General Medical Council. They spend their lives harassing whistleblowers and those who do not quite "fit" into their mould. There are ways that are used to assasinate careers. One does not require a GMC sanction to do so. As it happens, Diamorphine Queen Jane Barton keeps her General Practice job, with no known investigations or sanctions by her local PCT. Those responsible for NCAS have not acted on her hazardous prescribing and she will no doubt obtain a fat NHS pension and live happily after. Professor Christopher Bulstrode is her brother. Enuff said.

So we ask ourselves, what of other doctors whose careers have been effectively assassinated?One such doctor is Dr Helen Bright. Her case is best described by Dr No in a piece describing constructive erasure. What of Dr Sushant Varma, a junior PRHO who was cut in his prime. What of Dr Prabhu Satya, another junior doctor whose career was assassinated, what of Dr Gopakumar who was catastrophically assassinated. What of whistleblower Dr Shreedar Vaidya who was struck off for having the wrong kind of temperament.? All these doctors did not inject diamorphine. What of Dr Pakistan who remains on a 18 month sanction suspension by the GMC. What of Dr Giri Katti, another doctor struck off in his prime. They did not end life. Yet the assassination of their careers are overlooked by many people. These are only a fraction of doctors struck off and hounded by the GMC.

They are particularly overlooked by the General Medical Council and the CHRE. Why have these friends of mine had their careers irreparably damaged?

Why is Dr Barton's career preserved while my friends lives are left in tatters? Dr Peter Wilmshurst was quite correct in his article on the GMC. The General Medical Council was responsible for the first Dr Shipman, it will be responsible for the second Dr Shipman. There are no handbrakes in place to hold this regulatory body accountable for their amateur and substandard workmanship.

We have often stated that the actions of the General Medical Council were profoundly discriminatory and they frequently practice "inconsistent in decision making". Unfortunately, the last year, Collins J ruled that two cases on the same facts could have different outcomes at the General Medical Council. This follows that the UK Courts are very happy with discrimination by the General Medical Council and there is currently no remedy for these inconsistencies. The GMC therefore breaks its promise to be " consistent" as advertised on their website. This is how they will justify their decision to keep Jane Barton on the General Medical Council Register. To the public, she is a killer, to the General Medical Council, all her colleagues will rally around to "save her". What of the dead patients?

I am grateful to the Gosport campaigners for raising a national issue that I attempted to raise many years ago. There is a problem in the NHS, it is the overuse of diamorphine. This problem needs to be address by the GMC and the profession. I hope there is now some recognition for this so innocent lives are not lost.

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About The Author

There is a lot of things most people can say about me but in reality I am NHS Whistleblower. In 1998, I followed the guidance set out in Good Medical Practice[GMC] and raised concerns about substandard care on Ward 87 North Staffordshire NHS Trust. I also raised concerns about the large number of Midlands Hospitals covered by West Midlands NHS Executive in 1999. Following the recordings of the HSMR scores, only Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust spiked their figures. This was due to the inordinately high death rates. These deaths could have been prevented had the government acted in 1999. There are many other hospitals with equally high death rates but 1000s have not raised the HSMR scores. The Mid Staffordshire Inquiry shows poor standards that are similar to many hospitals in the Midlands [particularly Distinct General Hospitals]. They were also the identical to the concerns raised by me in 1999, many years before.

In 2010 the CQC finally admitted that North Staffordshire had "significantly high mortality" in the years I raised concerns.

This blog follows my adventures as a whistleblower. It was written between 2008-2010. It seeks to present what the media have never done. I also aim to discuss a number of medical issues important in the NHS today. A short account of my experiences is presented here.

Essentially, I raised concerns in 1998, locally then to all the authorities, the GMC, Department of Health and Trust attempted to say there was no substance to my concerns. In 2005, I discovered that all authorities had concealed the 1998 and 2001 internal reports that verified my concerns. This is a brief step by step summary of the events related to Ward 87.

Between 2000-2002, the General Medical Council conducted a "discreet inquiry" into my Fitness to Practice. I was never told of this investigation until I discovered quite by accident following a subject access request under the Data Protection Act 1998. The GMC were subjected to litigation by me due to the illegal investigation and repeated leaks of prejudicial information to potential employers. They were beaten in court following the first litigation of its kind. The GMC settled the case in favour of me. During litigation, the GMC subjected me quite severe harassment by revolving door vexatious complaints - 2 in total. I was cleared of all of them. I was never subjected to any Fitness to Practise hearings. All complaints were thrown out at case examiner's stage despite the GMC's malevolent intentions.

The GMC subsequently erased me from the Register for non payment of subscription fees. It should be emphasized that I was never sanctioned or struck off has speculated by some bloggers. In total, I have been subjected to 4 years of complaints that had no relation to my clinical work. This has had catastrophic consequences to my work as a doctor and eventually caused the assassination of my references in 2007.

This led to the test case R v General Medical Council Ex Parte Pal with the intention of defining the definition of potential misconduct and preventing vexatious complaints against doctors. The complaints were made by Penny Mellor and her associate Fiona Wollard [ niece of Professor Sir Charles George].

While permission was granted by a judge with Employment Law experience, the final hearing was lost courtesy of Justice Sir Andrew Collins who made various statements. One was that the GMC was free to rule differently on two separate cases with exactly the same facts and the other was to widen the analysis of misconduct to include conduct outside the profession. Justice Sir Andrew Collins has sat on numerous cases related to the GMC. He has often failed to declare that his brother Dr Mark Collins was once prosecuted by the GMC for alliances in Clapham Common. Details of this can be read here.

The two diametrically opposite analysis of misconduct was also discovered following the GMC's submission to R v General Medical Council Ex Parte Remedy UK. Essentially, one analysis appears to be used for some foreign doctors and a different more lenient definition is used for establishment doctors such as Liam Donaldson. The GMC were essentially caught red handed touting two different analysis of misconduct in two cases. This discrepancy is currently being investigated by both the CHRE and the Equality and Human Rights Commission.

The defenses to all these cases have taken up 52 files. By comparison, the GMC refused to investigate the doctors on Ward 87 despite the fact that their conduct was directly related to clinical work. They continue to work in various positions in the UK. No one was held accountable despite 2 reports verifying my concerns. Moreover, the Health Commission refused to conduct a broader data study in relation to the Ward 87. The GMC and Ombudsman refused to inform the patients on the Ward of the 1998 and 2001 Reports. The Sentinel newspapers refused to feature a legitimate advert.

In 2009, after discussion with Dr Phil Hammond, he wrote an excellent piece in Private Eye. While the media have provided little or no support for these issues, I am indebted to my fellow bloggers - Dr Rant, The Jobbing Doctor, Dr John Crippen and Witchdoctor. This blog exists to protect other doctors who I hope will never tread the path of whistleblowing. It is a path paved with injustice. It also serves to show the public that they cannot legitimately expect doctors to raise concerns in such a dangerous terrain. This indeed places patient safety in great jeopardy.

This blog ended in February 2010 as it was unlikely that I would ever return to medicine. I have also decided to end this particular saga here. I hope this blog will educate, entertain and remind the public that whistleblowing is a dangerous escapade and no junior doctor has treaded the same path as I have for a reason. The terrain is unsafe and always has been. I would say that I have been relatively unsupported in my journey through whistleblowing but singlehandedly I have been able to undercover evidence and establish some very important issues regarding the dangers of whistleblowing. I have ceased to respond to the media but I am always very happy to discuss matters with the public.

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Saturday, 30 January 2010

General Medical Council. "It is run by amateurs rather than legal experts" Says Dr Wilmshurst

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