Re: Software with western components
Indeed the Medical Act 1983 was exactly what the slopey-shouldered Head of GMC pointed to, to get himself off the hook. If, as a regulator of doctoring in the U.K., they don’t actually have the legal power to do so, what is the point of them? More pointedly, he’s the head of a U.K. regulator, not a desk clerk at Hertz shrugging “computer says no”. He’s had decades to address the issue. It’s his *job* to go to government, outline the issue, present a solution, and make it happen.
The exact words on the GMC website are, in large title,
“Unregistered medical practice is against the law. Doctors practising medicine in the UK must have registration with a licence to practise. It is illegal if they practice medicine without this and is something that we would need to look into.” Apparently this is a simple untruth, intended to deceive the public who haven’t read the Medical Act 1983.
I also don’t think either he or you realise just how big this is. This isn’t about a couple of scam doctors on the internet.
#1 We have no idea how many unlicensed doctors are currently practising in the U.K. via this mechanism. It’s completely hidden by the power of micro-targeted advertising. It’s enormously unlikely this is the only company, statistically it’s much more likely I stumbled across one of dozens or even hundreds. It’s quite possible that entire very large U.K. communities are now getting the majority of their medical diagnosis and care this way. Maybe, the whole of Stamford Hill, the whole of Bradford, or large parts of London. No way to even guess. The GMC haven’t shown the remotest curiosity to find out.
#2 For all we know, the level of harm could be extraordinary. There could be large numbers of deaths, and we would know nothing, because to certify cause of death for burial, you just need to be a *doctor*. The main safeguards brought in after Harold Shipman were via revalidation to *remain a licensed doctor*. If you are an unlicensed doctor, that all disappears.
#3 What makes you think this is limited to private medicine? “Classically” NHS hospitals can only hire doctors who physically live within this country, to work. I don’t give a damn where they are born. It seems that restriction for the NHS to hire only GMC-registered doctors is little more than a gentleman’s agreement. To change it, doesn’t require the agreement of government, or NHS England, or even the NHS Trust. The hiring manager can just hire an unlicensed doctor, and the only consequence is the disapproval of their colleagues if they get found out.
This is a new world. Today, 30% of all GP consultations are phone calls. It is going to be *far* cheaper to hire a doctor external to the U.K. to do those. There’s no central check of what GP surgeries are doing. If a GP surgery individually contracts out its remote consultations to a company in the Philippines, as long as it does the number of “doctor” consultations it’s contracted to, and meets its audited QOF targets, it gets paid. How would the patients even know? They get phoned back by a GP they don’t know, which is normal for a large practice. And they get a reasonable consultation.
Now we know this is *legal*, perhaps this is actually the model for a significant minority of NHS GP practices *today*. Maybe you’ve even had such a GP appointment yourself, and been unaware. Did you check the GP name on the Medical Register? Because from the GMC is saying, the Surgery wouldn’t be doing anything wrong, at all, and therefore has no reason to tell anyone.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
