Right let's clear something up.
It's not the GP's fault, in this instance.
Yes they are. You will find that when you take out a critical illness policy, there will be a tick box that you need to tick to give the insurer permission to ask your GP for your medical record.
If you don't tick this box, the insurer will probaly still give you insurance, based on a best guess of the risks.
However, if you do need to make a claim some years later, you will be sent a claim form, and this will state that the insurer needs to see your medical history in order to complete the claim process. They will send you a form asking for permission to access your full medical record, in order to assess the claim.
A GP will only release details from your medical history to a non-medical source with your explicit consent. This is part of the Information Governance guildlines mandated by the PCT. Any GP who releases details of your medical history to any non-medical source without your consent would face serious consequences.
Insurers often do get a medical history from your GP at the time of the policy creation, as I mentioned earlier, again only with your consent.
However, it's the format in which they receive these results which can be different. Some insurers will only request a "quick patient summary" at the time of policy creation. If you need to make a claim x years later, they may request a "full patient summary" at this point.
Then they start fishing at claim time...as ThomasSoerensen alludes.
Theoretically, the 2 summaries should be the same. However, the "quick patient summary" is an abbreviated version, and the full summary as you can imagine can be a 30+ page affair.
Should you be in a situation where the insurer quibbles over a medical instance in your history, that is nothing to do with the reason you are claiming, and yet they argue the GP made the wrong diagnosis, you will find that most GP's worth their salt WILL vigourously defend in YOUR favour, since in essence the insurance company is accusing the GP of malpractice, and believe me, should it go that far, the BMA can get involved and slap the insurer silly. Usually just the threat gets the insurer to back off.
It's not the GP's fault, in this instance.
now it seems details held with them aren't confidential either
If you don't tick this box, the insurer will probaly still give you insurance, based on a best guess of the risks.
However, if you do need to make a claim some years later, you will be sent a claim form, and this will state that the insurer needs to see your medical history in order to complete the claim process. They will send you a form asking for permission to access your full medical record, in order to assess the claim.
If the insurer can get a complete medical summary about me, who else can ? and why dont they get one at the time of the application for insurance, to avoid any 'misunderstandings' ?
Insurers often do get a medical history from your GP at the time of the policy creation, as I mentioned earlier, again only with your consent.
However, it's the format in which they receive these results which can be different. Some insurers will only request a "quick patient summary" at the time of policy creation. If you need to make a claim x years later, they may request a "full patient summary" at this point.
Then they start fishing at claim time...as ThomasSoerensen alludes.
Theoretically, the 2 summaries should be the same. However, the "quick patient summary" is an abbreviated version, and the full summary as you can imagine can be a 30+ page affair.
Should you be in a situation where the insurer quibbles over a medical instance in your history, that is nothing to do with the reason you are claiming, and yet they argue the GP made the wrong diagnosis, you will find that most GP's worth their salt WILL vigourously defend in YOUR favour, since in essence the insurance company is accusing the GP of malpractice, and believe me, should it go that far, the BMA can get involved and slap the insurer silly. Usually just the threat gets the insurer to back off.
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