Patient wanted a trust to pay for a scan he had arranged

What happened

Mr B injured his ankle while playing football. The next day he went to see his GP, who referred him to the local A&E department. Mr B had an X–ray that did not show a fracture. The emergency nurse practitioner diagnosed a soft tissue injury, a term that includes an ankle sprain. The nurse gave Mr B advice about this and told him to return if his condition got worse.

The emergency nurse practitioner also offered follow–up physiotherapy but Mr B declined this as he already had his own private physiotherapist. Mr B then arranged a private MRI scan himself, which cost him £320. He wanted the Trust to repay this.

Mr B also complained about inaccuracies in the Trust's response to his complaint. The response misidentified Mr B's place of work and wrongly stated that a medical professional had arranged his MRI scan.

What we found

We did not uphold Mr B's complaint. The care and treatment the Trust gave Mr B was appropriate and in line with established good practice. The Trust was correct not to offer him an MRI scan for the type of injury he had.

The results of Mr B's private MRI scan were consistent with a diagnosis of a sprained ankle.

The Trust acknowledged that the reference to Mr B's place of work was an administrative error. It also told us that it is unusual for a scan to be arranged directly by a patient, so it had assumed that Mr B's GP made the referral.

The Trust's explanation for these minor administrative errors was reasonable and we did not consider that these mistakes were so serious that they were failings.