Can anyone help me please?

My colleague has just been advised by DWP that if a MEd 5 Medical Certificate is signed by anyone other than the client's own doctor - another partner in the practice- then that Med 5 is only valid for a month??

Can this be true? DWP claim it's their guidance but is it lawful? I know it's Friday but this seems completely absurd to me.

Help!!

and what to they say where the practice is one where the person is registered with the practice, not a named doctor, as many practices are now doing?

I think that there has been a misunderstanding somewhere along the line. Guidance as you describe is false. However it is true (a one month maximum period) where a doctor issues a sick note based on the report of another doctor or where the doctor issues a sick note more than one day after the patient was last examined and has not previously issued a sick note since that examination (schedule 1A of The Social Security (Medical Evidence) Regulations 1976).

Sorry am now confused - so if a Med 5 is signed bu a GP other than the GP who actually saw the patient it will only be accepted for one month even if it is for longer than that, for example 3 months?

So in principle then the DWP guidance is right?

Sorry to be dense - it is Friday................................

Yes.

A Med 5 is a retrospective certificate created from notes without an examination - so if it was not the doctor who actually examined the patient but say a hospital doctor or another member of the GP practice, it is presumably considered to be of lower evidential value than a certificate from someone with first-hand knowledge.

Hearsay evidence, in short - and that is never as good as evidence from an eye-witness.