A practice in the Newcastle upon Tyne area

4. Mr O complains about the care and treatment he had from the Practice. Since 2017 he says he has experienced urinary retention (not being able to empty the bladder), chronic pain in his pelvis and lower abdomen and acute prostatitis (inflammation of the prostate gland).

5. He says since 2017 the Practice has missed many opportunities to make an accurate diagnosis, provide the right treatment and to refer him quickly to a urologist (who specialise in conditions affecting the urinary and male reproductive systems).

6. Mr O says his pain has got worse because of the Practice’s failure to treat him correctly or to give him any pain relief.

7. Mr O says he has been unable to work since 2019, as he was dismissed due to bladder problems disrupting his work.

8. He explains he now needs intermittent catheterisation (using a catheter to help you urinate when you need it) and this negatively affects his health and wellbeing.

9. He says the Practice’s failure to refer him to a urologist sooner has contributed to, if not caused, his acute prostatitis.

10. Mr O would like an apology, service improvements and a financial payment to equal the yearly salary he missed when he was dismissed from work.

11. Mr O has been experiencing pain in his abdomen and bladder since 2017. He has had different types of investigations like a camera test and a computerised tomography scan (CT scan). These came back clear, but Mr O continues to have the same problems.

12. Mr O has been prescribed different types of medication to try and help with his symptoms, like pain relief, antibiotics, and diclofenac suppositories (medicine to reduce swelling and pain). Unfortunately, nothing has worked.

13. In 2019, Mr O was dismissed from work due to the amount of time he spent in the toilet and he has been unable to work since.

14. Mr O was referred to a urologist by his local hospital on 17 December 2021 and again by the Practice on 15 January 2022.

15. Mr O must be catheterised as he cannot urinate naturally. He is now under the care of a urology team.

17. The law says we cannot investigate a complaint where a person has (or had) the option to take legal action, unless we consider this is (or was) unreasonable in the circumstances. We do not consider whether legal action would succeed, but whether it would be a reasonable option to look in to.

18. We discussed with Mr O the outcomes he wants from making his complaint. He accepted the Practice gave an apology in its final complaint response and we can see it has also explained improvements it has made after recognising it should have referred Mr O to a urologist sooner.

19. We asked if Mr O had considered taking legal action before due to how seriously he says he has been affected by what happened. He told us he had and would be hesitant to do this because of the costs and not knowing how to start a legal claim.

20. We think it would be reasonable for him to look into making a clinical negligence claim, because he is claiming the Practice’s service had a negative effect on him. He has lost his income and is unable to live a normal life.

21. If we did look at the complaint, we could be denying Mr O the opportunity to get a more significant and appropriate outcome. We have also considered that he may wish to explore this option while he is within the time limit for making a clinical negligence claim. This is three years from the date when a person knew there was a problem.

22. We recognise that making a clinical negligence claim can be emotionally challenging. It is important to note that this action would involve having a dedicated solicitor or legal professional to support you who has an interest in winning the case. Also, there are ‘no win, no fee’ organisations that can help with the costs of taking legal action.

23. Because the Practice has already apologised and explained what improvements it has made, the only outstanding outcome is for a financial payment based on a loss of earnings. A court is best placed to consider this and to award any financial payment.

24. For the reasons explained above, we have asked Mr O to look into taking legal action and we will not continue to investigate his complaint.

25. If after exploring the legal route, there are parts of Mr O’s complaint that he has been unable to look in to, he can return to us but he must do this as soon as possible. This is because of our time limits for investigating complaints. Our time limit is clear that complainants must come to us within a year of when they first became of the issues being complained about. If a complaint comes to us outside of this, we will have to look at the reason for the delay.

26. If Mr O does come back to us, we will consider the action that he has taken, how far his case progressed and whether his complaint is in time. We will then decide if we can consider his complaint further.

27. We are sorry to hear of the events that led to Mr O’s complaint. We understand how distressing this will have been and appreciate the efforts he has made in bringing his complaint to us.

1. We have carefully considered Mr O’s complaint about a GP practice in the Newcastle area (the Practice). We are sorry to hear how Mr O has been affected by the concerns he raised. It is clear he continues to have a difficult and distressing time, and we understand he wants to put things right.

2. We think it is reasonable for him to explore taking legal action to resolve his complaint. We will explain the reasons for our decision in this statement.

3. Complaints give us valuable insight into the organisations we investigate, so we would like to thank Mr O for sharing his experience with us.