Is medicolegal work a duty?

• medicolegal work

With the amount of money spent on settling medicolegal claims by the National Health Service in the United Kingdom soaring, should all ophthalmologists join the fray and give their advice to the courts? The increase in medical litigation is a worldwide phenomenon but with huge differences between countries in the value and frequency of settlements.

It is sometimes suggested that it is a duty of every ophthalmologist to give advice on medicolegal cases in order to help the courts operate efficiently and fairly, and most especially pressure is put on distinguished ophthalmologists to take on the work, as their specialist opinion is particularly valuable.

But is it really a duty and should we feel in any way compelled to take on this work? I will argue that it is not a duty, that it distracts us from our main work, and that we should not normally take it on.

Why do we take on medicolegal work anyway? There are three main reasons.

Firstly, it is a duty to colleagues, to the court, and to the running of the legal system: is the path of duty the way to glory?

The Oxford English Dictionary defines a duty as an “Action, or an act, that is due by moral or legal obligation; that which one ought or is bound to do.” That a sense of duty is widespread and powerful cannot be doubted. Saki wisely observed “people will do things from a sense of duty which they would never attempt as a pleasure.” Virtually everyone …