GP to be investigated by the GMC

Having said that, I have wondered before about emergency, life saving treatment. How do Muslim women get along then, it is acceptable for a doctor (male) to rip the clothes off a lady who is quite literally going to die without immediate life saving interventions. For example, a lady who needs life saving resuscitation and the paramedics who turn up are all male. The clothes are normally cut off then to expose the body.

"Can I ask what the reaction would be if the patient was a Christian woman asked to remove her blouse by a Muslim doctor, say to check her heartbeat (which can be done without removing clothing) - would the condemnation of the doctor be the same?"

I hope that the condemnation of the doctor in this case ^ would be the same no matter what religion he was from. Asking any religious woman to remove her blouse if it isn't necessary is also very insensitive and could be seen, I imagine, as harassment and/or an infringement on her religious beliefs.

I'm not doctor or nurse, but, IMO, in most cases, medical procedures can be performed while still showing respect for the patient's religous or cultural beliefs and practices. IMO, it's part of showing respect for the patient as a whole person and not just a medical patient.

Points taken, maddyone, about emergency situations. I just hope that, in that case, the patient and their family would be willing to put their beliefs on the back burner for the sake of saving the patient's life. I hope, but I'm not sure.

To be honest Starlady, I’m not a Muslim but I feel acute embarrassment if I have to expose my body to any medical personnel ie mammogram, cervical spear test, but I grit my teeth and get on with it. However normally those conducting such exams are female. I will only agree to an intimate exam if the doctor is female, my GP is female, but I would still be embarrassed. If I’m ever unfortunate enough to need a hospital consultation where I would need to expose intimate parts of my body I would request a female consultant, if one was available, but even then I could find myself being seen by one of their team, and that person could be male. I’d just have to grit my teeth and get on with it. I think that’s what we all have to do where medical things are concerned.

People can be operated on whilst staying veiled in all non medically justified access/assessment areas. The NHS have "dignity gown" which have approval of religous heads and can be used for proceedures and operations where non female staff are present.

A full body assessment doesnt have to be done by a lead clinician. A female doctor or nurse can do that part of a critical assessment and report findings to lead clinicians, who can then access specific areas of concern while keeping the rest of the body covered.

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2016/03/04/muslim-women-multi-faith-dignity-gowns-hospital_n_9385452.html

“For Muslim women, to have any flesh exposed, other than their face and hands, is like having very private parts of the anatomy, such as the breasts, displayed."
^that would apply to the face of a veiled woman

Most of the major religions allow exceptions for emergency treatment etc

But that was NOT applicable to the woman in this case. There was no medical reason for her to remove her veil

I'm not judging because I don't know the details but I do have some observations:

The GP apparently asked her to remove her veil and she didn't decline or make any comment so presumably he didn't think she minded.

Perhaps she didn't speak clearly and, like me, found it easier to understand as he could see her lips. Doesn't sound to me as if she had a problem about it.

I wonder why she didn't take someone in with her if she knew she didn't speak clearly but perhaps she didn't. Why did her husband stay outside?

We don't know why the GP spoke to the press, they may have had a version of events and he felt it necessary to defend himself or he may have done it deliberately to get attention.

I agree that the hospital was in a difficult situation and may simply have passed the buck. I have experience of someone being ultra cautious in a similar situation.

It is quite possible this is racist against a Muslim but also possible that the husband just had a hissy-fit when he heard his wife took off her veil.

He should be investigated. The ignorance and arrogance shown by this GP is astonishing. I don’t believe for a moment that he couldn’t hear her, I have lived and worked with in the Middle East with Muslim women and the veil does not impede conversation to any degree. He was very ignorant and disrespectful and at the very least needs some retraining.

Are there no Drs or not enough Drs of the same faith available for different religions & cultures .

Or doesn’t that make any difference ?

It shouldnt. Empathy doesnt require one to have the same background..

maybe the muslim lady should find a female doctor ?

She wasnt the patient Moggie she cant possibly have expected that she would be asked to disrobe

She wasn’t asked to disrobe. she walked to remove her veil!

‘Sheer ignorance and arrogance shown by this GP.......’

No, not ignorance and arrogance, he asked her to remove her veil because he couldn’t understand what she was saying. If his diagnosis was impeded because he couldn’t hear what she was saying, he’d have been in trouble for failure to diagnose correctly or misdiagnosis. His job is to treat his patient, his patient was the child. My daughter is a GP, and I have heard her speak about the need to diagnose correctly, the pressures GPS are under, the need to be correct and professional at all times etc. The numbers of people who make complaints about doctors are unbelievable, she was warned when she was in medical school ‘You will all have complaints made against you, this is the society we live in.’
The child was the patient, the doctor was treating the child. He was putting the needs of the child first, the need to diagnose and treat correctly. He may have been a bit less than PC but for goodness sake, was the child treated properly? That’s the question.

And for all the comments on here, very few have even mentioned the child. Who was most important in that room? The mother? The doctor? No, it was the child.

Without having been present at the consultation, I'm not sure that anyone is in possession of all the facts.

However, I don't understand why the doctor felt it necessary to ask the woman to remove her veil. We have only hearsay that the woman's husband sat "glowering" in the waiting room - and it would be naive to imagine there is no possibility that the "witness" to this alleged glowering had his or her own agenda in reporting this. We do, though, have a photograph of the doctor adopting a very defiant stance in the photograph - hands on hips, staring into the camera.

Doctors are in quite a powerful position in relation to their patients - anyone who has had a less than satisfactory consultation with a rude or dismissive doctor will understand that. Patients sometimes feel intimidated by doctors, but good doctors do their best to put patients at their ease, rather than making them feel more vulnerable and uncomfortable.

I doubt very much that the GP would be struck off for this if he was found to have acted improperly. I imagine he would be asked to attend further training.

I think we are in danger of losing perspective here. As has already been said we don't know all the facts but we do seem to have forgotten that the only thing the doctor did was to ask her to remove her veil. He didn't insist and she didn't complain. If she had been uncomfortable about it surely she would have said something? We have no idea how he asked, whether she felt pressured or not, we don't know whether she struggled with the language or whether her English was fluent. I think it is wrong to judge him, her or her husband as we know very little.

EllenVannin You say "I'm not being racist by saying that a foreign doctor hadn't told me that I'd had a mini-stroke after I'd had a scan for dizziness. If I had been racist I'd have written to the media because this was a serious health matter 18 months ago-----but I didn't !!"

The very fact that this example sprang to your mind to demonstrate you "not being racist" suggests otherwise.

There should now be trained interpreters in-situ at surgeries or if a patient doesn't speak English then a friend/relative who can. Doctors have enough to do than spend their time trying to decipher what the patients are saying-----it goes for those who are English spoken but aren't necessarily understandable with their diction.

EV it’s impossible for a variety of reasons to have trained interpreters in situ. In our area GPs have access to interpreters by phone - I think it’s called Language Line. But this event is nothing to do with interpreting but everything to do with training and protocols. But the real issue is that the OP swallowed hook line and sinker the doctors version of events. Look at the words in the OP - madness, well respected GP, respectfully asked, undergo such an investigation, a good GP. Basically the OP felt this family had no right to complain based on tabloid journalism. Well we all have a right to complain to the GMC and the GMC have processes in place to investigate complaints which fortunately are based on more than what the tabloid press report.

marye I agree that its not practical, or affordable to have trained interpreters available in surgeries but I can't agree with your other conclusions. I simply don't think we have enough information to blame the GP or condemn him. Hopefully when the investigation is complete MSM will inform us but if it turn out to be a non-story I doubt we will ever know.

But that’s exactly my point Nonnie - the OP supported the doctor based on his version of events, I support due process ie the investigation that is happening. I haven’t condemned anyone except the doctor for giving press interviews and photo shoots whilst under investigation - not a good look and not professional. I think starting threads like this based on one side of a story is not helpful.

Marye I think we are 'singing from the same hymnsheet' apart from not knowing why the GP spoke to the press. We don't know what pressure he was under. Yes, I am fence-sitting!

Nonnie yes overall we are except for his speaking to the press - it really wasn’t acceptable. Suppose you made a complaint about your GP to the GMC and then he gave his side of the story plus photos to dozens of media outlets - it’s literally been reported all over the world. Would you feel there was a level playing field or that the die was cast against you? It’s not a good look is it? As I said upthread, he would belong to a medical defence union, they would give him advice, appoint a solicitor , draft a press statement for him and basically they would have told him to button it.

I agree with you maryeliza, in fact I would go further, in such cases as this no one should speak to the press, it should be sorted out through the proper channels privately. The child needs to be protected from identification, the doctor should not be identified, by him/herself or by others, unless wrong doing was proven, and I can’t for the life of me think that the parents would wish to be identified. As maryeliza says, if this were you or I , would we want to be splashed across the tabloids? I wouldn’t for sure, how embarrassing that would be. If I were the complainant I certainly wouldn’t want to be identified. And I’d be mortified if a doctor complained about me and the whole country knew!

But central to this case is the child, and his or her right to be treated correctly and with dignity and his/her privacy respected.

But Marye did he give it to 'dozens of media outlets' perhaps he gave it to just one and the others picked up on it. Just imagine a scenario when you are approached out of the blue and told you have been accused of something which comes as a complete surprise to you. How would you react? You might say something unwise which you later regretted.

Still not defending him, don't know enough but am trying to think of all possibilities and not be judgemental