A practice in the Stockton-on-Tees area

3. Ms R complains about the care and treatment she received from the Practice in January 2025. During a visit to the Practice, a verbal altercation between Ms R and a nurse resulted in the Practice de-registering Ms R and placing her on the Special Allocation Scheme (SAS). Ms R complains:

• the staff failed to deliver the clinical care she required • the Practice wrongfully removed her from the Practice and placed her on the SAS, abusing their power.

4. Ms R is also complaining about North East and North Cumbria Integrated Care Board (the ICB). Specifically, she complains:

• the ICB wrongfully dismissed her appeal against the Practice, refusing her request to be reinstated to the Practice register.

5. Ms R believes she has been significantly impacted by what happened during this appointment. She says this has caused her to feel extremely depressed and anxious. She explains she did not receive the necessary clinical care and has had to use private care as she does not feel comfortable using the SAS. She also believes that the false allegations of assault made to the police by the Practice may have the ability to harm future job prospects, impact her personal life, and visa applications unless they are formally retracted.

6. Ms R has told us the ICB’s decision has caused her significant distress and made her lose faith in the system.

7. As a result of bringing this complaint to us, Ms R is seeking service improvements, an apology and financial remedy.

8. Ms R visited the Practice in January 2025 regarding an issue with her ear.

9. Ms R and a nurse at the Practice had a verbal altercation during the appointment which resulted in the Practice de-registering Ms R and placing her on the SAS.

10. The Practice filed a police report about this on the same day it occurred.

11. Ms R believes the Practice wrongfully removed her and placed her on SAS abusing its power.

14. 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 discussed this with Ms R to understand her complaint. We also discussed with her how the Practice’s actions have impacted her, and what outcomes she is hoping to achieve from complaining to our service.

15. Ms R has told us she feels the Practice has directly discriminated against her, defamed her character, abused its powers and failed to appropriately treat the problem with her ear.

16. Ms R felt that there may be a potential of discrimination against herself which she has stated in her complaint form.

17. During our investigation, we have been informed by Ms R and the Practice that Ms R has pursued legal action by instructing a solicitor. The Practice have also confirmed that Ms R’s solicitor has made direct contact with it already.

18. During our initial phone call with Ms R on 5 December 2025, Ms R explained she was interested in ALR but was having discussions with her husband due to the costs of securing legal representation.

19. After this initial phone call, we enquired with the Practice to obtain its removal policy, due to not getting a response on our initial email to it on 17 December 2025. We sent a follow up email on 12 January 2025 in which we received a response from the Practice Manager to explain Ms R has taken legal action over the same matter. The Practice Manager explained it would allow the Practice’s solicitors to respond to the patient's own solicitors through the legal channels.

20. After this response from the Practice Manager, we contacted Ms R and she confirmed that she had acquired legal remedy for this complaint against the Practice.

21. Based on Ms R’s complaints of potentially negligent treatment, discrimination and defamation, she may have grounds for a legal claim. We appreciate Ms R is taking this action and we have seen no barriers which would prevent her from moving forwards with a legal claim.

22. As a legal remedy is open to Ms R we need to consider whether it is reasonable for her to pursue this action.

23. We have considered the outcomes that Ms R seeks which includes the compensation and whether we are likely to recommend the injustice claimed. Ms R has told us that she would £1000 to be paid by the individuals highlighted in the complaint. There were three individuals highlighted in the complaint. Therefore, Ms R was asking for a financial remedy of £3000. This would have fallen under level 4 of our Severity of Injustice (SOI) scale.

24. Due to Ms R actively pursuing legal action, we have not asked for more information about the impact to assess where it would be placed on our SOI scale. However, this level of financial remedy she would like from our service could not be guaranteed at this stage. Given that Ms R has secured legal representation and is moving forward with this route, we believe it would be reasonable for her to pursue a legal claim.

25. Ms R has provided no barrier during our initial call with her to taking legal action. We must infer that after discussion with her husband; the family has decided to take legal action was the most appropriate for them.

26. We have also considered that Ms R has brought a complaint component about the ICB stating it made a wrongful decision not to uphold her complaint about the Practice’s decision.

27. Ms R has not given us any specific outcomes about this part of her complaint. Therefore, we cannot at present determine whether this part of the complaint would be most suitable for legal action. This said, we would be unable to decide about this complaint component without also deciding as to whether the Practice did the wrong in its decision to de-register Ms R. This is a key component of her complaint and is closely linked to the legal action we understand that she is taking.

28. Following the legal action, Ms R can return to us if she has outstanding outcomes that court are unable to order or if the court was unable to consider parts of her complaint.

29. We would ask that Ms R come back to us promptly if she is unable to proceed with legal action or if there are outstanding outcomes. This is because we are unable to investigate complaints brought to us 12 months after someone has become aware of the problem. We may put this time limit to one side if we think there is a good reason to do so and would consider any legal advice or action sought

30. Overall, we consider it reasonable for Ms R to explore the potential legal claim. She is already pursuing this claim and has no barriers preventing her. We will therefore close Ms R’s complaint at this time. We wish Ms R all the best for the future moving forwards.

1. We have carefully considered Ms R’s complaint about the Practice. We were sorry to hear about Ms R’s experience with the Practice. We appreciate Ms R has felt distress at being placed on the Special Allocation Scheme (SAS), and she was experiencing problems with her ear at the time of this incident. We understand this has been difficult for her.

2. We have decided not to consider Ms R’s complaint further. This is because we consider it is reasonable for Ms R to pursue an alternative legal remedy (ALR) on the issues she has brought to us. We explain the reasons for this below.