Advertising regulator issues warning to GP practice over PA description

A GP practice has received a slap on the wrist from the UK’s advertising regulator for its description of physician associates (PAs). 

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) told Pulse that it issued Churchfields Surgery with an ‘advice notice’ based on claims the practice had made about the ‘training and qualifications’ of PAs.

This warning urged the Midlands practice to ‘avoid unduly conflating’ PAs with GPs and ensure all claims made in their ‘ads’ are accurate. 

Churchfields Surgery senior partner Dr David Law told Pulse that they will ‘further amend’ their website in light of the advice from the ASA, in order to ‘improve any oversimplifications’ they may have made. 

According to its website, the practice currently has three PAs, one of whom is a partner.

A page on the site which describes the role of physician associates, dated March 2022, says that a ‘contact with one of [their PAs] should feel just the same as care from a GP’.

It also criticises the Government’s delay in giving PAs the right to sign prescriptions or order x-rays, saying it is their ‘continuing hope that this aspect of regulation is amended’.

On PA training, the Churchfields webpage says: ‘Here in the UK the Physician Associate programme accepts graduates with a science degree (such as “Biomedical Sciences”) and then provides an intensive two year post-graduate training programme to prepare them for the NHS workforce. 

‘Physician Associates train in and are examined in a broad medical curriculum and must pass stringent final examinations to become qualified.’

PAs are described on another page of the practice’s website as ‘collaborative healthcare professionals with a generalist medical education’. 

The ASA told Pulse that it received a ‘complaint’ regarding claims made on the surgery’s website about the training PAs have before practising. 

A spokesperson for the advertising regulator continued: ‘We sent Churchfields Surgery an Advice Notice, reminding them to ensure all claims in their ads are accurate, and avoid unduly conflating the respective roles, training and duties of PAs and GPs. As such, we consider the matter closed.’

An advice notice is used when the regulator considers there are ‘potential problems with an ad’ but does not consider the issues to be ‘so complex or significant’ as to warrant a ‘full formal investigation’. 

‘We don’t expect a reply from an advertiser when we send an Advice Notice, but we do expect them to take it seriously and carefully follow our rules going forwards,’ the ASA added.

In response, the surgery’s senior partner Dr Law confirmed to Pulse that they had received a warning which asked them to ‘check’ how PAs are described on the website.

He continued: ‘We welcome their advice because we are fully committed to openness with our patient population, and any other website users, about the clinical staff that form part of our practice. 

‘In the light of the advice we will further amend our site seeking to improve any oversimplifications that we may have made. 

‘Our passion is to offer high quality and good access to our patients and believe this is achieved best with a diversified clinical staff.’

Earlier this week, the BMA announced it would financially back Anaesthetists United’s legal case challenging the GMC on its failure to ‘properly distinguish’ between qualified doctors and PAs.

And the RCGP, which recently voted to completely oppose any role for PAs within GP practices, yesterday set out guidance severely limiting the scope of practice for those already in employment.

It said that while the RCGP cannot enforce the guidance, as this is the ‘decision’ of employing GPs – it ‘may be taken into account’ by NHS Resolution and medical defence organisations in clinical negligence cases.

Last week, the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges called on the health secretary to start a ‘rapid review’ into the safety and effectiveness of the PA role in the NHS.