medical hong-kong
What causes of action against Hospital Authority physicians, when they refuse to prescribe all necessary medications that can be dispensed for free?
<h3>Premises and Postulations</h3>
<p>The patient <a href="https://www.ha.org.hk/visitor/ha_visitor_index.asp?Content_ID=10045&amp;Lang=ENG" rel="nofollow noreferrer">must pay to consult with Hospital Authority (&quot;HA&quot;) physicians</a>, but deservedly and legitimately need the myriad medications that Patient is requesting from HA.</p>
<h3>Hypothetical fact pattern</h3>
<p>HA clinics dispense <a href="https://www.ha.org.hk/hadf/en-us/Updated-HA-Drug-Formulary/Drug-Formulary.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">medications for free, including minerals and vitamins</a>. According to news reports and consumer complaints, some HA physicians are too stingy. These miserly physicians refuse to prescribe all of Patients needed medications. When patients request them all, these Patients try to shoo them. These HA physicians show them door and allege</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Please buy these medications at a pharmacy.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Then patients bring up their low income, or stress that they cannot find a pharmacy that sells them. But these physicians still try to cast Patients out.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I am not willing to prescribe so much on a single consultation, even if you are impoverished. I advise you to consult a private doctor or <a href="https://www.privatehospitals.org.hk/en/hospitals.htm" rel="nofollow noreferrer">a private hospital</a>, or formally complain to the Hospital Authority.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Threatening to complain fails to solve the problem. These skinflint physicians won't budge.</p>
<p>Patients who complained to HA before  find the complaints process too sluggish and useless. HA's solution is to book another consultation — HA is just asking Patients to try their luck, and to stumble on a kindhearted doctor. HA forbids patients from requesting a specific Physician. HA doesn't guarantee Patients can see the same Physician.</p>
<p>Indubitably, patients must not need to debate tightfisted physicians, or be brushed off — particularly if they are too ill or unable to debate!</p>
<h2>Questions</h2>
<ol>
<li><p>Ought these patients to rely on Contract? Or Tort? Or both? Contract law applies, because the HA's Fees and Charges are contractual consideration.</p>
</li>
<li><p>What causes of actions do Patients have against these pinchfists Physicians? <strong>I am seeking details, not just a vague or short answer introducing the tort of (medical) negligence.</strong> Undoubtedly, Patients are interested in convincing Physicians to prescribe these medications during their consultation, not to sue them after.</p>
</li>
</ol>

<h2>The doctor is a professional</h2>
<p>Engineers don’t put extra wings on airplanes because the client asks. Lawyers don’t throw unsubstantiated allegations in their pleadings because the client asks. Accountants don’t change the balance sheet because the client asks. And doctors don’t prescribe unnecessary medications or vitamins because the client asks.</p>
<p>For most people with normal health and a relatively balanced diet, nutritional supplements are medically unnecessary. They may make the user feel better through the placebo affect but doctors prescribe things that are <em>necessary</em>, not things the patient <em>wants</em> but doesn’t <em>need</em>.</p>
<p>You can sue a doctor if they are negligent. One sure sign of negligence is if they adopt the treatment plan proposed by the patient without applying their professional judgement.</p>
