A practice in the Doncaster area

3. Ms L complains about the care she received from the Practice going back to 2000. She says it:

• did not treat her for deep vein thrombosis (DVT is a condition where blood clots form in veins located deep inside the body) in 2000 • failed to help or treat her mental health issues going back to 2010. She explains it would not reassess her bipolar (mental illness) diagnosis • did not treat her many stomach issues and diabetic symptoms • did not provide appropriate care for her symptoms linked with the menopause and it would not prescribe hormone replacement therapy (HRT) • did not properly assess or treat her hypermobility condition (when you have flexible joints that cause pain).

4. Ms L explained how this affected her as:

• her many health conditions were not properly treated • her mental health issues were made worse by the other medical issues • she has been unable to work and had issues with her family.

5. Ms L would like an apology from the Practice for the problems she has experienced. She would also like compensation for her distress and for not being able to work for several years.

8. The law says a person must complain to us within a year of becoming aware of the problem. We cannot investigate complaints brought to us after one year, unless we consider there is a good reason to.

9. Ms L told us she has been to the Practice many times about her DVT. She explains she has struggled with her mental health since childhood and was diagnosed with bipolar in 2010. She says she has been to the Practice many times over the years with concerns about this diagnosis and her mental health treatment.

10. Ms L says she has also suffered with stomach issues and diabetic symptoms for many years, and she went to the Practice about this as far back as in 2015. She says since 2015 she has been to the Practice with symptoms that suggest the menopause. She says the Practice never diagnosed or treated her fully despite returning with the same symptoms. Ms L also says the Practice did not investigate her hypermobility properly although she mentioned this many times.

11. Ms L explained that all the issues complained about were ongoing at the same time and were linked, which made her overall health worse.

12. We are sorry to hear about the difficulties Ms L experienced. The Practice said it would not investigate these issues as she brought the complaint too late after the events happened.

13. We can see all of these issues date to between eight and twenty three years ago. Ms L says she knew there was a problem at the time, and went to the Practice several times, over a long period. We think Ms L knew about a problem with each issue many years ago and this means her complaint is out of time.

14. We can put our time limit to one side, if we think there are strong reasons to. Our usual approach in deciding if we can put the time limit to one side would be to ask the complainant for their reasons for delay.

15. Because of the time that has passed, we think it is very unlikely that Ms L would be able to give strong enough reasons to explain the delay.

16. Ms L said her date of awareness for some parts of her complaint is more recent. For example, she has had new diagnoses and treatments since changing her GP in 2020. She also says in the past few years she found a consultant letter from 2003, saying she should have been prescribed blood thinning medication.

17. We can see Ms L’s complaints about her care and treatment are complex and linked. It would be difficult to separate the different issues she complains about.

18. In situations like this we look at the complaint issues together. While recent events have caused Ms L to question the care she had many years before, it is reasonable to say she knew that something was wrong a long time ago.

19. For example, Ms L feels her more recent encephalitis (inflammation of the brain) diagnosis could have been the cause of her long-standing mental health issues. She told us she asked the Practice to review her mental health treatment and diagnosis several times over the years. This shows us she was unhappy with the treatment she was getting many years ago but did not make a complaint at that time.

20. It seems likely that most or all the complaint issues are out of time for us to investigate. We have not seen strong enough reasons to put our time limit to one side and we are taking no further action.

21. We would like to repeat how sorry we are to hear Ms L’s account and how she has been affected by the issues she raised. We do not want to dismiss the impact on her and wish her well for the future with her new practice.

1. The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman has carefully considered Ms L’s complaint about a Practice in the Doncaster area (the Practice). We are sorry to learn of the long term physical and mental health problems Ms L has experienced.

2. We have decided that Ms L’s complaint came to us outside of our time limit and for this reason, we cannot investigate it.