Can you trust your doctor?

Maybe, like me, you missed this investigative programme on Channel 4 last week. If so, you may like to view it here, as I have done tonight. "GPs are among the most trusted and respected of all professions. They are our first port of call for most NHS treatment with 800,000 people visiting surgeries every day. But Dispatches reveals that failing doctors routinely slip through the system."

The programme shows very clearly that many GPs lack basic diagnostic competence, even with potentially very serious conditions like bowel cancer, breast cancer and angina. Although they are very highly paid and are accorded high status in our country, there are examples of doctors not following diagnostic guidelines in cases in which prompt diagnosis can mean the difference between life and premature death. Britain has one of the lowest cancer survival rates in Europe.

Even when two health professionals, a practice nurse and a doctor, turned whistleblowers about a GP who had fallen well behind with important patient results - blood tests and the like - the PCT (Primary Care Trust) concerned did not properly inform the patients concerned. The PCT's concern was clearly not patient safety.

Nor was the GMC's concern patient safety. (The GMC is the General Medical Council.) But then when is patient safety ever the GMC's concern? Regular readers of this blog will know that the GMC is a worse-than-useless 'regulator' and that in my opinion we would be better served by abolishing it than by attempting to reform such a travesty of a regulator. I think Trading Standards or Consumer Protection would be more appropriate, since these bodies have some concern for public safety, while the GMC is only concerned about the safety of doctors. If you click on the label GMC beneath this post, you will hopefully find on your screen a clutch of blogposts I have written over the years disparaging the GMC.

However serious the incidents of professional negligence, however many patients suffer and die before their time because of lousy doctors, nothing ever improves. I sometimes think of this as the proud motto of the NHS: We will never willingly improve. - Why don't you try to get something done about our flawed healthcare system and what is, effectively, the unaccountability of doctors? - After all, you, or someone you love, could be the next victim...

How can the GMC possibly be allowed to continue as a regulator?

How can the GMC possibly be allowed to continue as a regulator? - I have many times inveighed against the uselessness of the GMC and I have many times called for it to be scrapped. It has no regard at all, other than rhetorical, for the safety of patients, and it routinely protects lousy doctors from anything but the most lenient of punishments for very grave malpractice. But this report by the Sunday Telegraph of its investigation into the case of a grossly negligent, incredibly ignorant, fraudster of a doctor really MUST be followed by the speedy demise of the General Medical Council. This is a national scandal of mind-blowing proportions. I urge you to read the whole article; a mere summary seems inadequate.

I must say my sympathies lie with Dr Sarah Myhill

This medical doctor has been barred for a year from practising medicine. - See Wales News report. - I must say I found it laughable to see the useless General Medical Council described as a 'medical watchdog!' - Medical lapdog or medical lickspittle would be nearer the mark in my opinion. - As readers of this blog will know, the GMC tends to punish serious medical malpractice with a light tap on the back of the hand and a slightly disapproving smile. Here we have a much graver sanction doled out to a somewhat out-of-the-ordinary medical doctor who tries to help patients by improving their nutritional status, a wholly admirable endeavour. - I wish this doctor lived in my neck of the woods!

What do you think? - See Dr Sarah Myhill and Dr Sarah Myhill's GMC Hearing.

GMC fails yet again to protect the public from sub-standard GP

The Telegraph reports that GP Navin Shankar, who had dismissed Nicola Sams' 6 years of irregular bleeding and abdominal pain, which turned out to be the symptoms of terminal cancer, as 'nothing to worry about', has not been removed from the Medical Register. This is despite the GMC's earlier leniency toward this this lamentably sub-standard doctor when he failed to recognise the seriousness of the illness of a nine-day old baby.

Here's a suggestion for the Coalition Government: save a load of money by abolishing the GMC, the partisan Watchdog/Lapdog that routinely protects the interests of its doctor members, rather than the interests and health of patients, which is ostensibly its raison d'être.

I'm pleased that the General Teaching Council is to be scrapped.

The Telegraph reports that the General Teaching Council is to be scrapped, partly to save money and partly because it hasn't been much use.

If only the useless, partisan General Medical Council could be scrapped too!

Dr Jane Barton should have been struck long ago. And in my opinion she should be in prison for, in effect, killing twelve of her patients.

Correction: The first sentence in my title should say 'Dr Jane Barton should have been struck off long ago.'

The Telegraph reports that Dr Jane Barton faces being struck off after prescribing overdoses of powerful painkillers to 12 elderly patients who died in her care. When you read the report you will be astonished to discover that the GMC panel "concluded that the facts found proved (both admitted and otherwise) would not be insufficient to support a finding of serious professional misconduct."" and that "allegations that Dr Barton failed to assess patients appropriately before prescribing opiates were not proved.""

You will wonder, along with me, whether the members of the panel are half-wits, though you will doubtless come to conclude, as I have long held, that the GMC offers no protection to the public at all, since it routinely treats erring doctors with the utmost leniency, however grave their error and however grave the consequences.

The GMC should be scrapped. It is a waste of money and by its continued leniency towards negligent and incompetent doctors effectively it endangers the health of the public.

Further Example of the Shortcomings of the General Medical Council

The General Medical Council (GMC) refused to warn other countries about the incompetent surgeon who had botched the liposuction procedure he carried out on Colin Hendry's wife, Denise, the Telegraph reports. The surgeon, Dr Aniansson, is still working as a doctor, in Sweden, where there have also been complaints about him, apparently.

This is a further example of the dangerous partisanship of the GMC: it routinely favours protecting the reputations of negligent doctors and shows precious little concern for the safety of patients. I have written about this before.

The GMC should be abolished.

GMC has been failing relatives of the Gosport dead

Independent on Sunday report
"Families threaten to boycott General Medical Council probe into deaths of elderly patients at Hampshire hospital."

It is long past time that the useless and partial GMC were scrapped.

Suspicious deaths of ten elderly patients in Gosport War Memorial Hospital in 1998 are at last going to be examined by the Coroner.

Gosport hospital deaths: Who's to blame?
Read the Independent on Sunday's investigative article.

Extract:

"An unprecedented inquest will this week begin to examine the suspicious deaths of 10 elderly patients who died unexpectedly after being given high doses of powerful painkillers and sedative drugs at a hospital in Hampshire.

"The hearing, granted last year by the Justice Secretary Jack Straw, despite the fact that seven of the people concerned have already been cremated, highlights nearly 100 other cases at Gosport War Memorial Hospital which may be related.

Relatives of at least 92 patients involved in the case have fought for the past 10 years to have the matter investigated thoroughly. They believe the deaths have never been properly explained and want those involved to be held to account. They want to know whether their relatives died as a result of accidents, incompetence or what some fear might be something more sinister. They believe that there was a culture of treating patients with palliative care – as though they were dying – rather than rehabilitating them.

They point out that this week's jury hearing at Portsmouth Combined Court comes seven years after a damning report by the NHS watchdog which identified systemic failings in medication prescribing.

The Government has so far rejected relatives' calls for a public inquiry into the deaths, despite stinging criticisms about the way they were handled by the police and the General Medical Council (GMC). Three police investigations have failed to shed light on why the patients died. The GMC, in particular, has been lambasted by the relatives for its failure to act promptly and decisively."

The GMC is notorious for protecting negligent doctors and doing little if anything for their innocent patient victims and their families. It should be abolished and the money that is wasted on it should be put to good use. The NHS, disgracefully, is also notorious for protecting negligent doctors and doing little if anything for their innocent patient victims and their families...)o: - It too should be scrapped. - Sadly that is unlikely to happen since the NHS is the biggest employer in the country and if any government had the courage and decency to scrap it, it would be, in effect, voting itself out of office.

I do hope the long-suffering relatives of the dead patients get an honest and satisfactory outcome from the inquest/s and that they get it without further long delays.

Disgraceful GMC ruling that doctor who left two women unable to have children after unnecessary operations "for research" be allowed to continue work.

Doctor who carried out unnecessary hysterectomies allowed to continue working
article in the Telegraph

Extract:

"Dr Martin Quinn, a consultant gynaecologist, was found guilty of misconduct by the General Medical Council (GMC) which ruled he should not have carried out hysterectomies on both women.

He was suspended from working for six months but will be allowed to practise after that time.

One of the women involved said that she was "bewildered" that a consultant who had "terrified" her into believing that radical surgery was her only option would still be allowed to work in the NHS.

The GMC found that Dr Quinn had failed to act in the best interests of both women.

The panel found him guilty of misconduct and that his fitness to practise was impaired.

Dr George Lodge, chairman of the panel, told Dr Quinn that his actions represented "misconduct so serious as to call into question whether you should continue as a registered doctor, either with restrictions on registration or at all."

He added that the panel was concerned that he had allowed his research interests to "intrude unacceptably" into his care of patients.

But the panel suspended Dr Quinn for six months, saying they were satisfied there was no evidence of a general lack of competence and no previous evidence of misconduct."

So the panel "were satisfied there was no evidence of a general lack of competence"! - But competence was not the point at issue here! - At issue was this surgeon's probity - his honesty - his ethical standards - his morality. The question is not, "Did he do these operations competently?" - but "Should he have done these operations at all?" - I myself have not the slightest doubt that this doctor should be deregistered because of what he has done to those women by deliberately deceiving them into unnecessary hysterectomies they did not want, did not need, and which caused them all the risks and pain and distress of major surgery. - I'd be strongly inclined to deregister the GMC panel that came to this indefensible decision too...

Actually I further consider that in doing this major surgery on the women, by dint of giving them false information, that this is a crime - grievous bodily harm, perhaps? - and should be judged in a Court of Law. - What do you think?

What a useless shower is the GMC! - All the expensive shower has ever done is protect negligent doctors. They do not protect the innocent public/patients/victims, although the pretence is that protecting the public is why they exist and it is public money that pays for the GMC. - The GMC has never been of any use to patients. It should have been scrapped decades ago, and even more urgently now. - A waste of money, a waste of time (pretending to damaged patients that their concerns will be properly dealt with when it will all really just be a waste of time), a mockery of justice!

The GMC has suspended Raj Persaud from practice for three months for plagiarism.

Persaud suspended from practice for three months over plagiarism
Article in the Guardian

Extract:

"It was the scale of his dishonesty which did for Dr Raj Persaud, the celebrity psychiatrist who was reprimanded and suspended from practice for three months by the General Medical Council last night.

The best-known "mind doctor" in Britain could be either an outstanding practitioner or a matchless media performer for the profession, the GMC decided. But he did not have time to do both. Laden with columns, book commissions and broadcasting jobs, Persaud harvested eight degrees and diplomas, a hospital consultancy, two research medals and a professorial chair by the age of 43.

"I was under stress. I should have been much more careful," he told a four-day fitness-to-practice hearing in Manchester. But the stress was of his own making and drove him to make plagiarism a habit.

He was told by Dr Anthony Morgan, chairman of the panel of four experts, two men and two women: "The public is entitled to expect that doctors will be honest and trustworthy at all times, and that they adhere to the highest standard of probity. Your conduct has fallen below the standards of behaviour that the public is entitled to expect from doctors and undermines the public's confidence in the profession."

Persaud, who appeared regularly on TV's This Morning programme, admitted nine cases of plagiarism but denied that he had been deliberately dishonest. The panel heard evidence that he wrongly had blamed sub-editors for missing out attributions and quotation marks, and dismissed his defence.

Morgan said that all four members were "in no doubt that your dishonest conduct and plagiarising other people's work on multiple occasions represents a serious breach of the principles that are central to good medical practice".

Imposing the suspension, Morgan told Persaud that the panel's lightest option, of a warning and imposing conditions on his practice, was "insufficient as they would not adequately reflect the gravity of your misconduct, or protect the public interest by maintaining public confidence in the medical profession".

The short suspension was influenced by the fact that Persaud had "cut down on [his] media and journalistic projects" and "was more cautious about taking on extra work".

The action was triggered by a complaint from the Scientology movement, which has crossed swords with Persaud over modern psychiatry, but widened to include a growing number of allegations.

The Citizens Commission on Human Rights, founded by the Scientologists, complained to the GMC that a hostile article by Persaud in the Independent in 2005 plagiarised several passages from another professor.

Persaud, a keen poker player and risk-taker, was embedded in the medical establishment in a way which partly explains the GMC decision to go for suspension rather than a warning. He lectured to the National Institute for Clinical Excellence, examined students, and was even a referee for articles submitted to the Journal of Medical Ethics.

Persaud claimed his dual skills made him an ideal "talking head" for psychiatry, compared to what he called "unqualified media pundits who normally dominate the media debate". Personable and fluent, he seemed well-qualified to advise other people on how to run their lives. His undoubted talents made lasting friendships, and several media figures, including Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan, and the broadcaster Martin Bashir, said last night that they wanted to work with him again."

Well he has been foolish and dishonest but at least he hasn't harmed any of his patients, unlike so many of the medical profession.

BBC psychiatrist Tonmoy Sharma has been struck off the medical register

BBC psychiatrist Tonmoy Sharma is struck off

Extract from the Telegraph:

"A psychiatrist who regularly appeared as an expert on the BBC has been struck off the medical register after he lied about his academic qualifications and performed unethical drugs tests on mentally ill patients.

Tonmoy Sharma, who was a senior lecturer at the Institute of Psychiatry in London, has been exposed as a fraud who repeatedly referred to himself as a "professor" when records show that he had never completed a PhD thesis.

Despite this, Sharma, who was registered at the Clinical Neuroscience Research Centre in Dartford, Kent, regularly used the letters PhD after his name and managed to deceive the NHS and some of the world's largest pharmaceutical companies.

He also appeared on the BBC2 series Mind of a Murderer in 2000 and was often used as an expert commentator on BBC News Online stories.

A General Medical Council panel yesterday found Sharma guilty of "serious failings of personal integrity" after hearing that he recruited mentally ill patients to test drugs without seeking proper approval.

Andrew Popat, chairman of the panel, told Sharma: "Your persistent and wide-ranging dishonesty and untruthfulness, spanning a number of years, together with your lack of insight, is so serious that it is fundamentally incompatible with your continuing to be a registered medical practitioner.""

Convicted surgeon can return to work. - In my considered and informed opinion, the GMC is not fit for purpose and should be scrapped.

Convicted surgeon can return to work

Extracts from the Telegraph:

"A doctor who went to practise in India after leaving a father to die of an infection has been told he can return to Britain to work.

Amit Misra, 37, was suspended for a year after failing to act when Sean Phillips, 31, fell ill after a routine knee operation at Southampton General Hospital in 2000.

He was convicted of manslaughter at Winchester Crown Court in April 2003 and given an 18 month suspended prison sentence.

Despite failing to prove himself in a series of medical assessment tests, the General Medical Council has ruled the trainee surgeon should be allowed to work here again."

"Mr Phillips, from Southampton, was expected to leave the hospital the day after his operation, but caught a bacterial infection and developed toxic shock syndrome. He died after doctors failed to spot the infection or properly examine the blood test results.

Mr Phillips' father, Myles, of Faversham, Kent, said: "The doctors have assessed his performance and have found it lacking. There is no way he should be back on the register.""

You can rarely, if ever, accuse the General Medical Council of putting patient safety first...)o:

Professor David Southall could face the end of his career after a further reprimand from the General Medical Council

Controversial paediatrician reprimanded again

Extract from The Guardian:

"Leading paediatrician Professor David Southall could face the end of his career after the General Medical Council found yesterday that he inappropriately accused a distressed mother of drugging and then murdering her 10-year-old son.

The GMC tribunal will sit again today to decide whether Southall's behaviour constitutes serious professional misconduct and if so, what the penalty should be.

Southall has faced a series of inquiries by the GMC into allegations brought by parents of children taken into care on the basis of his evidence of abuse.

He was banned from child protection work for three years after he was found guilty of serious professional misconduct in 2004 for accusing jailed solicitor Sally Clark's husband of murdering their children on the basis of remarks he made on a television programme. Clark was later freed on appeal and has since died.

Yesterday's hearing concerned a woman referred to only as Mrs M, whose older son had been found hanged in 1996. Southall was asked to prepare an independent report for Shropshire county council in 1998, after concerns about the safety of the younger son, then eight years old, led to him being taken into care.

The GMC panel found that Southall went beyond his remit in accusing M of killing the older boy.

Giving evidence by video link from Adelaide, where she now lives, M said Southall had repeatedly asked her how the older boy died and she demonstrated using a pencil and a shoelace. She told the panel that Southall looked at her and said "very clever" in a sarcastic voice.

The boy was found hanging from a curtain rail. Southall said to her, she continued, sobbing: "I put it to you that you killed your son by injecting him, hanging him up, leaving him there and then ringing an ambulance.""

I hope that the GMC decides on the severest penalty for this foolish, dangerous man, who has caused grieving parents and families such great, needless, unjustified further suffering.

Some junior doctors are being forced to stay in unsuitable jobs

Junior doctors forced to stay in unsuitable jobs - Telegraph

Extract:

"Junior doctors are being forced to remain in jobs that they did not want and have been threatened with disciplinary action if they move.

The debacle of the Government's new recruitment system for junior doctors continues to worsen for the thousands caught up in it.

Doctors who accepted a training job earlier in the year, believing it was the best they could hope for, were told they risked being referred to the General Medical Council [GMC] if they accepted a better offer.

Letters sent out by the medical deaneries offering junior doctors their training post include a paragraph saying a complaint will be made to the GMC if the doctor accepts the job and then changes their mind."

It seems mean to have the threat that "a complaint will be made to the GMC if the doctor accepts the job and then changes their mind."

Paediatrician, David Southall, will not contest application to extend the ban on his working with child abuse victims.

Banned paediatrician bows to GMC decision - Guardian

Extract:

"The paediatrician who accused the husband of solicitor Sally Clark of murdering their children will not fight moves to extend his ban on working with child abuse victims, his lawyer said today.

David Southall, 59, was forbidden from working on child protection cases for three years after he was found guilty of serious professional misconduct in 2004.

A review meeting held today at the General Medical Council (GMC) headquarters in Manchester heard the doctor would not contest an application to extend the ban for 12 months.

His lawyer, Alison Foster QC, said the doctor would "freely accept" restrictions banning him from working on child protection cases.

He was severely criticised by the GMC for contacting the authorities after watching a Channel 4 Despatches documentary about the case in April 2000.

Despite having no previous involvement with the investigation into the deaths of the couple's children, Dr Southall told police it was "beyond reasonable doubt" that Steve Clark murdered his sons, Christopher and Harry.

The doctor was branded irresponsible by the disciplinary panel which investigated the case following a complaint from Mr Clark."

I hope the GMC continues to extend its ban on this arrogant, foolish man, who has caused so much needless distress to so many people.


Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
How to Lose weight!

See my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/.html
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See Sodium in foods and Associated health conditions

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free...

UK Army doctors in Baha Mousa case 'colluded in cover-up'

UK Army doctors in Baha Mousa case 'colluded in cover-up' - Independent on Sunday

Extract:

"Doctors who examined Baha Mousa, a 24-year-old Basra hotel worker who was kicked and beaten to death in British custody in 2003, have been reported to the General Medical Council.

The move follows allegations that army doctors who treated the detainees colluded in a cover-up by misdiagnosing and failing to properly document the extent of prisoners' injuries. Doctors who examined Baha Mousa said in legal evidence that they saw no injuries on his body, except "a little dried blood" around his nostril.

However, a post-mortem found that Mr Mousa had 93 injuries. Photographs of his corpse show clearly his face, chest and upper body covered with contusions and bruising.

The details of Mr Mousa's injuries and his medical inspections are outlined in a 383-point dossier submitted to the Ministry of Defence by Phil Shiner of Public Interest Lawyers, who is acting on behalf of the former detainees.

The dossier will increase the pressure for the Ministry of Defence to hold a full public inquiry into the abuse and torture of Iraqi civilian prisoners in Basra by UK troops. Mr Shiner has listed every example of inconsistency in evidence or allegation of abuse to come out of the courts martial – which jailed one soldier and acquitted six others – into the 2003 beatings.

The former detainees, all civilians with no links to insurgency groups, are now launching a civil action against the MoD, claiming they were hooded, beaten, subjected to sleep deprivation and noise, and held in stress positions during their detention.

Further developments last week saw one of England's most senior judges order the release of evidence used during the courts martial, which the MoD had been withholding from Mr Shiner."

Russell Reid found guilty of serious professional misconduct.

Sex change doctor guilty of misconduct - Guardian

Extract:

"The UK's best-known expert on transsexualism was today found guilty of serious professional misconduct for rushing five patients into sex-changing treatments, but avoided being struck off.

The General Medical Council ruled that Russell Reid, who retired last year, could only return to work under strict conditions imposed for the next 12 months that mean he can only work under strict supervision.

He must provide the GMC with a record of his treatments of any patients with gender identity disorders such as transsexualism every three months.

The disciplinary panel ruled that Dr Reid must no longer prescribe patients with sex-changing hormones at the first appointment, nor without a firm diagnosis that they are transsexual or a proper psychiatric assessment.

The panel determined that the consultant psychiatrist was too quick to provide patients with hormones and to refer them for genital surgery.

"The panel considers that the seriousness of your misconduct lies in your lack of caution in initiating hormonal and surgical gender reassignment treatment in these patients without more careful and through investigation and assessment," said John Shaw, the panel chairman.

"The panel therefore determined that your misconduct was serious, and that you are guilty of serious professional misconduct.""

Not much of a punishment, is it? The GMC can always be relied upon to exercise unwarranted leniency in dealing with negligent doctors...)o:


Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

UK Doctors to face regular competency tests and General Medical Council stripped of some powers. Also Nick Clegg, Andy Burnham, complacency...

Doctors to face regular competency tests

Extract:

"Doctors are to face checks every five years to check that they are competent to continue working, under new plans announced today.

The Government is also to strip the doctors' regulatory body of a key powers, in a move likely to anger medical professionals.

The General Medical Council will lose the right to adjudicate in fitness to practise cases when complaints are made against doctors.

The GMC will still investigate concerns about doctors but the final decision on what happens to a doctor is likely to pass to an independent tribunal.

The Government's White Paper is part of a response to the Shipman inquiry, which was heavily critical of the GMC. "

Well it's certainly high time for the GMC to be stripped of its adjudication of complaints about doctors since it has always so scandalously favoured doctors over complainants. But I question the procedures that will comprise the competency tests. - Consider the following:

The high prices of new drugs is claimed to be necessary to pay the huge costs involved in the research and testing that by law has to precede the launch of a new drug. - But this 'justification' rings very hollow to me, a steroid victim.

The British National Formulary is a reference book doctors are assumed to use to look up important information about the drugs they prescribe. - For well over 20 years certainly, and maybe even longer, sodium retention has been among the side-effects listed for the drug that made me a steroid victim. - Because of this side-effect of sodium retention, all patients who are prescribed this medication, or any other of the many medications that result in sodium retention, should be warned not to eat salt or food containing added salt/sodium while taking the medication. - I was not given this VITAL warning and I do not know of even ONE person who was given this warning! - In consequence there are scores of thousands of steroid victims in this country - made needlessly and gravely ill and disabled because they were not given a simple piece of information, which surely, is the very reason that for all the expensive testing... - What use, then, all the testing? all the vast expense? all the laboratory animals that suffered to provide information for the researchers? - ARE ANY OF THE MANY, MANY DOCTORS WHO PRESCRIBE STEROIDS (INCLUDING PREDNISOLONE AND HRT) ET AL IN THIS NEGLIGENT WAY COMPETENT TO PRACTISE? - NOT IN MY OPINION. - THEY ARE CERTAINLY NOT COMPETENT TO PRESCRIBE OR TO MONITOR THESE DRUGS. - The drug companies themselves must have long known of the need to avoid salt while taking these medications and must also have soon become aware, as the numbers of steroid victims grew, that doctors were not giving the warnings, but there was no warning on the packs of drugs with which I was issued...

When is this scandalous situation going to be remedied? - My MP, Nick Clegg, wrote to the Secretary of State for Health about it last year but received only complacency in the response from Andy Burnham, and no promise of any action. See Individuals and agencies who are responsible for the 'Obesity Epidemic' - I hope you will read the whole page.

Prof David Southall, who was suspended from child protection work for three years in 2004, is to have previous cases reviewed

Prof Southall to have previous cases reviewed

Extract:

"Prof Southall is currently facing a hearing before a General Medical Council fitness-to-practise panel on a separate matter.

He is alleged to have kept about 4,450 “special” case files on children which were not stored on the child’s proper hospital file.

Lord Goldsmith’s spokesman said there were concerns that proper disclosure of medical records may not have been made in cases that led to a prosecution.. "

This is good to hear. Far too often crucial medical records get removed or are 'lost' when doctors are at fault and I have yet to hear of any sanctions being taken against this practice.