'Racial bias infecting General Medical Council'

RACIAL discrimination is “infecting” the General Medical Council (GMC), a tribunal said on Friday (18), as it pointed out the disproportionate number of complaints about ethnic minority doctors as compared with their white colleagues.

The tribunal’s comments came as it backed complaints made against the GMC by Omar Karim, 62, a Muslim consultant urologist of African and European heritage.

The judges ruled that the GMC had discriminated against Karim by continuing an investigation into him when it did not investigate the same allegation against a white doctor.

Heatherwood and Wexham Park Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, now the Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust, accused Karim, an internationally renowned specialist in prostate cancer and robotic surgery, of bullying and threatening behaviour towards a colleague after which he blew the whistle over concerns about poor practice, bullying and discrimination at the trust, The Times reported.

Karim was suspended by the trust after several investigations in his department and he was referred to the GMC at the end of 2014. However, the case was not heard until three years later. At a fitness-to-practice hearing in 2018, he was cleared of any misconduct.

After the ruling Karim accused the GMC of having “a callous disregard for the truth and honesty”. The GMC said it was “giving full consideration” to the findings. The trust did not comment.

The tribunal noted that ethnic minority doctors comprised 29 per cent of UK doctors.

"Employers, however, make 42 per cent of their complaints about [ethnic minority] doctors,” the tribunal said, highlighting that “ethnic minority doctors are 50 per cent more likely to get a sanction or warning than white doctors".

“We do not consider there has been a credible explanation for the difference,” The Times quoted the judges as saying, who added that the GMC “was looking for material to support allegations . . . rather than fairly assessing matters”.