BMA and Anaesthetists United join parents of Emily Chesterton in legal challenge to GMC over Physician Associates

The BMA today announced that it will financially support the legal case of the campaign group Anaesthetists United (AU) as they challenge the GMC on its failure to properly distinguish between qualified doctors and Physician Associates and Anaesthetic Associates (AAs). The BMA will provide an indemnity for any adverse legal costs of the GMC for certain stages of the case.

The BMA is also calling on the Government to confirm it will not use public money to support the GMC in its defence of the case.

The parents of Emily Chesterton, Marion and Brendan, whose daughter died aged 30 after two appointments with a physician associate whom she believed was a GP, have also joined the case, which seeks, amongst other things, to end the confusion between doctors and non-doctors which has put patient safety in danger. The indemnity from the BMA is to protect the AU and the Chestertons from the risk of financial loss arising from issuing the claim. AU’s legal challenge, which was announced in June 2024, has also been funded by donations which it continues to welcome.

The case alleges that the GMC’s failure to distinguish properly between qualified medical staff and MAPs by not enforcing a national scope of practice for the latter after they graduate, represents an unlawful failure in its duty to properly regulate the clinical practice of these associate professions in the UK.

Meanwhile the BMA continues its own legal action against the GMC over its using the term ‘medical professionals’ to encompass both doctors, PAs and AAs, which has eroded the boundaries between these very distinct roles.

The GMC is due to officially begin regulating PAs and AAs in December. 

BMA chair of council Prof Philip Banfield said:

“We stand alongside the grassroots campaigners at AU as they too seek to ensure patient safety in the UK is not watered down by the headlong rush to expand the role of the Physician Associate. Doctors are standing together to protect their patients and ensure that high quality healthcare continues to be provided in the NHS.

“The tragic case of Emily Chesterton, among others, should by now have made clear that blurring the lines between doctors and their assistants can have fatal consequences. It is unconscionable that despite so many warnings from medical professionals the GMC has forged ahead with its attempt to regulate PAs and AAs in a manner that encourages that blurring.

“AU’s case is very clear: if you don’t set out clearly what a PA can do and can’t do in a scope of practice then you have failed to carry out your duties as a regulator. The GMC enforces postgraduate training and practice for doctors but tells us that such enforcement for PAs and AAs should be left to individual employers. That is an abdication of responsibility that will lead to unscrupulous and possible illegal practice within hospital trusts and general practice, as we have already seen.

“We maintain that it was a mistake to make the GMC the regulator of PAs and AAs in the first place precisely because it would make the blurring of lines between these roles worse. But if they are going to regulate then they need to do so responsibly. Until there is a nationally agreed scope of practice setting clear limits on what AAs and PAs can do, they are not so much regulators as enablers of the kind of scope creep that has endangered lives.

“The Government must now make a choice. Taxpayers would be shocked if it put public money behind the defence of the indefensible and actively funded the attempt to prevent a national scope of practice for MAPs to keep patients safe. I urge the Government to offer patients and doctors the assurance that they will not allow public money to be given to the GMC to enable their defence.

“I thank the campaigners at Anaesthetists United for leading on this and look forward to pursuing this crucial campaign with them in the interest of patients everywhere.”

Dr Richard Marks, co-founder of Anaesthetists United,  said:

“We are pleased to say that the BMA has offered us crucial financial support to help our legal fight over PAs and AAs. We are deeply grateful for their help and recognition of how vital this is to healthcare in the UK.

“While the assistance is vital in enabling us to continue our fight, we remain significantly short of the funds required to see this case through to the end. We continue to welcome donations from the public to help keep the GMC accountable in its role of protecting patients.”

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