The practice fully supports the NHS Zero Tolerance Policy with regard to violence and abuse and the practice has the right to remove violent and abusive patients from our list in order to safeguard practice staff and other patients. Violence in this context includes actual or threatened physical violence or verbal abuse. The aim of this policy is to tackle the increasing problem of violence against staff working in the NHS and ensures that doctors and all other staff have a right to care for others without fear of being attacked or abused.
Our Staff have the right to be treated with dignity and respect at all times. They should be able to do their jobs without being physically or verbally abused.
Most people respect this.
Anyone found abusing the staff in person or on the telephone will be given a warning and may result in being removed from the practice.
Derogatory, negative and foul language towards the practice/staff will not be tolerated
The Practice will not tolerate threatening or abusive behaviour towards the staff. Our practice staff are here to help and assist you. Our aim is to be polite and helpful to all our patients. Rudeness, shouting, or swearing at any member of the practice staff will not be tolerated under any circumstances. If this occurs, you will be asked to leave the premises or, depending on the severity of the abuse, our alarm system will activate assistance from the Police.
If you are seriously unhappy with the quality of service you have the right to register with another practice without notifying us.
Removal from the practice list
A good patient-doctor relationship, based on mutual respect and trust, is the cornerstone of good patient care. The removal of patients from our list is an exceptional and rare event and is a last resort in an impaired patient-practice relationship. When trust has irretrievably broken down, it is in the patient’s interest, just as much as that of the practice, that they should find a new practice. An exception to this is on immediate removal on the grounds of violence e.g. when the Police are involved.
Removing other members of the household
In rare cases, however, because of the possible need to visit patients at home it may be necessary to terminate responsibility for other members of the family or the entire household. The prospect of visiting patients where a relative who is no longer a patient of the practice by virtue of their unacceptable behaviour resides, or being regularly confronted by the removed patient, may make it too difficult for the practice to continue to look after the whole family. This is particularly likely where the patient has been removed because of violence or threatening behaviour and keeping the other family members could put doctors or their staff at risk.