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Face the Facts: Doctors in the Dock

Doctors in the Dock

03/02/2011

BBC Radio 4 - Face the Facts, Doctors in the Dock

Is the General Medical Council the right organisation to regulate the medical profession?

Six years after the Shipman Inquiry recommended reform of the General Medical Council, key changes have not been implemented. A new regulator to discipline doctors is scrapped.

Is the General Medical Council the right organisation to regulate the medical profession? 
A new regulator to discipline doctors was due to take over in April, but it's being scrapped by the Coalition.
The removal of the adjudication role from the GMC was a key recommendation of the Shipman Inquiry six years ago. 
Now the medical charity, which registers all 239,000 doctors in the UK, will continue to act as judge and jury when investigating medical complaints.
Face the Facts discovers it is not the only key reform recommended by the Shipman Inquiry which has not yet been implemented by the GMC.
Modernisation of the 150-year-old organisation is not coming soon enough for relatives of patients who have died, and doctors whose careers have been ended.

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