Diane Baylis, clinical risk and education manager at Medical Protection, discusses how to manage the return-to-work process and the importance of helping staff remain in work

Medicolegal Adviser Dr Marika Davies explains how to maintain professionalism when dealing with trivial requests from patients

Removing patients from the practice list is an emotive issue, risking criticism from bodies such as the Northern Ireland Ombudsman, the General Medical Council (GMC) and the media and should only be used after careful consideration and as a last resort.

Recruitment is becoming harder these days so to attract the best staff it’s worth spending a bit of time to write a great advert for your vacancy. If you create a template, some information will stay the same no matter what role you are advertising.

We have written to invite a member of staff to a formal capability hearing after a period of informal professional support. He is now off work sick. What is the appropriate course of action for us?

Brain cancer accounts for quarter of all childhood cancers, yet many GPs may still not have experience of the condition. Dr Rachel Birch outlines a case where diagnosis could have been made earlier

Medicolegal Adviser Dr Marika Davies explains how to maintain professionalism when dealing with trivial requests from patients

Removing patients from the practice list is an emotive issue, risking criticism from bodies such as the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, the GMC and the media and should only be used as a last resort.

Charlotte Hudson, deputy editor of Practice Matters, interviews Nick Giles, area operations manager for the One Medical group - The Light, Leeds, about the secret to the practice's success.

Text messaging allows practices to target and contact hundreds of patients within minutes. Patients can respond by text with replies automatically forwarded to a specified email address. Many practices are signing up to using a text messaging service to inform patients of appointments, flu vaccinations etc.

Removing patients from the practice list is an emotive issue, risking criticism from bodies such as the Ombudsman, the GMC and the media, and should only be used as a last resort. The reasons for removing a patient from the list can be varied, but it should not be in response to patients lodging a complaint or failing to comply with treatment. Nor should it be used purely because a patient is highly demanding, offers criticisms or questions his/her treatment.

One incident can be investigated in a number of different ways – as a complaint, a clinical negligence claim, a criminal case, a disciplinary matter by your employer, a Procurator Fiscal’s FAI or a complaint to the GMC. An important starting point is your written report on the circumstances of the incident. This factsheet gives more information about writing this report.

Electronic communication can provide a useful and alternative point of access for patients. However, you should ensure that, if sensitive information needs to be sent electronically, safeguards are in place to avoid breaching patient confidentiality. This factsheet sets out the potential risks of electronic communication.