Criminal law undergraduate - Essay Example

Thus, if a doctor applies skill and care and functions in a style that is considered as an adequate practice, he would not be regarded functioning negligently despite a successful medical result cannot be assured. Where a doctor is found guilty of total negligence or has done a crime through malevolent intent to assault or harm a patient, this may end in a criminal prosecution. To face a criminal action by doctors is extremely a rare event for doctors in their professional capacity. If a doctor anticipated serious injury to the patient and done gross negligence by prolonging with the wrong medical procedures without the required consent or induced intentional harm, in such a scenario, a doctor will face a criminal prosecution.

In Kent v Griffins 2000], an ambulance was called by a doctor to shift a person to a hospital who was suffering from asthma. The control room replied to the doctor in affirmative. However, there was a failure on the part of ambulance to arrive in a reasonable time and as a result, the person suffered a heart attack which could have averted if the ambulance arrived in time. Claimant was succeeded. In this case, the doctor was not directly responsible for the sufferings of a patient but due to late arrival of an ambulance.

(The Thomas Hardye School 2010). In Barnett v Kensington Hospital 1969], three night watchmen went to a casualty hospital and complained severe vomiting and stomach pain after drinking tea in a shop . When the duty nurse contacted the duty doctor, he refused to come and suggested that they could visit their own doctors. One of the watchmen went to home and after few hours, he was dead due to arsenic poison. The claimant sued the doctor. The claim was not successful, mainly due to the fact that by the time the doctor was requested to check up the watchmen , the poison would have taken hold, and the watchmen’s fate was sealed