Physician associates accused of illegally prescribing drugs and missing diagnoses

Physician associates have attempted to illegally prescribe drugs at dozens of NHS trusts and missed life-threatening diagnoses, a dossier claims. 

Doctors working across the country claim patients’ lives have been put at risk by physician associates (PAs) who they say have failed to respond appropriately to medical emergencies – alleging more than 70 instances of patient harm and “near misses”.

The Telegraph has seen responses from more than 600 doctors to a survey on PAs run by Doctors’ Association UK (DAUK), a campaign group.

The data suggest that at over half of England’s hospital trusts, doctors are being replaced by PAs on the rota, despite associates only completing a two-year postgraduate course and having no legal right to prescribe.

A spokesperson from the Department of Health said their role “is to support doctors, not replace them”.

The Telegraph has interviewed more than a dozen surveyed doctors, as well as other clinicians worried about patient safety.

At Dudley Group NHS Trust, one junior doctor said a PA had missed an “obvious heart attack” on an ECG, having “just signed it as if it was normal”.

A clinician in primary care alleged PAs repeatedly misdiagnosed a patient’s metastatic cancer as muscle ache – despite blood results that were “tantamount” to a cancer diagnosis.

They said: “The patient could have been saved eight months of pain; their life could have been prolonged.”

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Source: The Telegraph, 27 January 2024