– Health Minister Dr Dan Poulter
The Government is committed to giving patients a stronger voice in the NHS, so that people have a greater say in where and by whom they are treated and importantly to ensure the NHS learns and improves from mistakes when things have gone wrong.
The GMC is rightly taking steps to better understand and deal with an increase in complaints, but it is important to reassure people that this does not mean that medical standards are falling and complaints to the GMC are not always directly related quality of front line patient care.
Complaints about doctors have reached a record high, the General Medical Council (GMC) said. Since 2009, the number of complaints has soared and in the last year alone there has been a 23% increase in the number of grievances lodged against doctors.