Does your GP surgery advertise the potentially life-saving Jess’s Rule?

Jess’s Rule is named in memory of Jessica Brady, a 27-year-old engineer who tragically died of stage 4 cancer in December 2020. Her terminal cancer was sadly, and consistently, missed despite her contacting her GP surgery over 20 times within six months.

What is Jess’s Rule

Jess’s Rule is a primary care initiative to encourage GP teams to rethink a diagnosis if a patient presents three times with the same symptoms or concerns, particularly if symptoms unexpectedly persist, escalate, or remain unexplained. These posters were designed to help reinforce the important principle of Jess’s Rule, ‘3 strikes and we rethink’ by asking GP teams to ‘reflect, review and rethink’ a patient’s diagnosis and any treatment.

It was hoped that displaying Jess’s Rule posters in areas of every GP surgery in England with high levels of staff/patient throughput (consultation rooms, staff room etc) would boost patient safety by prompting doctors to revisit patient records, challenge initial assumptions and remain alert to warning signs that might otherwise be missed. Essentially, it puts GPs at the forefront of helping to avoid tragic, preventable deaths by catching potentially deadly illnesses sooner.

It was thought at the time that those who would benefit the most from Jess’s Rule are younger patients and those from ethnic minority backgrounds who often face delays in diagnosis of serious conditions.

Timely and accurate diagnosis

Rachael Flanagan, Head of Medical Negligence and Personal Injury at Alsters Kelley said. “Every patient wants a timely diagnosis as that can lead to the correct treatment and ultimately a better outcome. However, we know that some conditions can be more difficult to identify in a primary care setting. And in the case of certain types of cancer, the symptoms might be similar to other less serious and more common conditions.”

Rachael continued. “It’s so important that patients feel listened to, and early indications are that Jess’s Rule has given the public confidence that their health concerns are acted upon. Patients are, after all, experts about what feels normal for their own body. This rule seems to be helping to formalise ‘best practice’ in general practice because it underlines the importance of taking time to reflect and review a diagnosis, particularly if a treatment plan doesn’t appear to be working.”

Rachael concluded. “We hope that the implementation of Jess’s Rule will support GPs to manage patients where they have been unable to offer a patient a substantiated diagnosis due to unclear or worsening symptoms, thus helping to improve quality of care and potentially saving lives by avoiding late or missed diagnoses of potentially serious conditions such as cancer or sepsis. In addition, it should lead to GP’s having more in-depth face-to face conversations with their patients, conducting thorough physical examinations, ordering additional diagnostic tests, asking a colleague for a second opinion, making a referral to secondary care and working more closely together with patients to make those all-important joint decisions about care.”

Specialist support and advice

If you have any concerns about the standard, or timeliness of diagnosis or treatment at your GP surgery, or would like help or advice on any medical negligence matter, please contact Rachael Flanagan on 01926 356030 or email rachael.flanagan@alsterskelley.com

We offer a free appointment where we can support and guide you in the right direction. And thanks to our network of offices covering Banbury, Coventry, Leamington, Nuneaton, Stratford-upon-Avon and Southam we are very accessible too.