Trainee doctors could be taken out of London hospital emergency department

A London hospital’s accident and emergency unit is being threatened with closure on safety grounds by the bodies responsible for approving and organising junior doctors’ training, for the first time in NHS history.

The General Medical Council is so worried about the risk to the safety of patients from the shortage of senior and middle grade emergency doctors at North Middlesex Hospital in north London that it has used its powers for the first time to issue a “pre-statutory letter,” warning that it could withdraw approval for junior doctors to be trained at the unit.

The letter was sent on 21 May to Health Education England, which arranges training posts. In the …