Serious Medical Treatment: Court Of Protection Emphasises Need For No Delay

The Court of Protection has sent a strong reminder of the need for Applications for serious medical treatment, to be issued without delay, where it is known that serious medical treatment is likely to be required and an application to the Court of Protection would need to be made.

In the matter of the Royal Bournemouth and Christchurch Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Dorset Healthcare University NHS Foundation Trust - v - SE (By her Litigation Friend, the official solicitor) (2018) EWCOP 45, Mrs Justice Theis was asked to consider an application for the proposed amputation of a patient's leg.

Mrs Justice Theis was critical of the Applicant's delay in bringing the application which required the matter to be determined in a matter of hours. The application could and should have been brought 2 weeks beforehand.

The Trust had attempted to deal with the matter by way of a safeguarding referral to the Local Authority but it was soon realised that the correct course of action was to issue an application to the court.

The Court was told that the Trust had insufficient access to appropriate legal advice to enable the necessary steps to take place to ensure that the family had been put on proper notice of the application (it is a strict requirement that any person who is reasonably believed to have an interest in the welfare of a patient, is put on notice).

The Court was critical that the correct procedural route was not followed by the applicant, and that this had led to the need for a hearing in the urgent applications Court, the day following the application being filed.

In addition, the Court was concerned that it appeared that it was not until the point in which an application was made that a detailed written care plan had been put in place to set out the detail of what was to be proposed on the day of the procedure, to ensure that the procedure would go ahead with minimal distress. It is said that the lack of detailed care plan was one of the reasons why the family had concerns regarding the proposed treatment, given the lack of understanding about...