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 "The patient who is armed with information, who wants to ask questions, sometimes difficult and awkward questions, should be seen as an asset in the process of care and not an impediment to it."

(Sir Liam Donaldson speaking at the Second National Service Delivery and Organisation Conference, Church House, Westminster. 19th March 2003.)

 "The doctor is the master of the clinical situation but the servant of the patient."

(Sir Liam Donaldson speaking on the subject 'The health of the people in England' at the annual gathering of the British Paediatric Neurosurgical Group, 15th March 2002.)

"New and explicit forms of accountability have been required and captured in the concept of clinical governance. This new accountability has redefined the relationship of doctors with the public, with their patients and with their employer."

(Sir Liam Donaldson writing in Postgraduate Medical Journal 2001; 77:65-67.) 

"Health care in the 21st Century will require a new kind of health professional: someone who is equipped to transcend the traditional doctor-patient relationship to reach a new level of partnership with patients; someone who can lead, manage and work effectively in a team and organisational environment; someone who can practise safe high quality care but also constantly see and create the opportunities for improvement."

(Sir Liam Donaldson writing in Quality in Health Care 2001; 10 (suppl II): ii8-ii12.)  

"The context in which medicine is practised in Britain has changed beyond all recognition since the profession took its first strides into the comprehensive system of heath care enshrined in the postwar ideal of a national health service."

(Sir Liam Donaldson writing in Postgraduate Medical Journal 2001; 77:65-67.)   

"As with clinical interventions, we should aim for high quality decision-making on ethical issues. Equally, we should use audit to see if this has been achieved, and if not, take action to improve the situation. We need to know more about what ethics support practitioners need - and which actually makes a difference. This conference has been an important step in that process and I am grateful to the organisers for giving me the opportunity to contribute to that goal."

(Sir Liam Donaldson speaking on the subject 'Health care delivery: ethical dimensions' at the conference, Difficult Decisions: Ethics Support in the Delivery of Health Care, organised by Nuffield Trust, BMJ and ETHOX, London, 27 February 2001.)

"The march of progress of medicine has been inexorable and indeed majestic during this century. It has played its part in improving the public's health status as well as relieving suffering for the individual patient."

(Sir Liam Donaldson speaking on the subject 'Healthcare Innovation' at the Sixth Annual Smithkline Beecham Science Policy Symposium, at the Royal College of Pathologists, Thursday 21 October 1999.)    

"Tomorrow's doctor will be working within a much more extensive framework of accountability than yesterday's. Some of the transition has already been made over the last few years as doctors have responded to and accepted the more explicit professional standards which now exist and the commitment to the NHS quality agenda. Discharging this more diverse form of accountability brings with it responsibility to a new style of practice - more multidisciplinary, more patient participation and more evidence based."

(Sir Liam Donaldson writing in Postgraduate Medical Journal 2001; 77:65-67.)    

"Doctors are often asked to provide expert evidence for the courts. Whilst there is a considerable body of work in the legal literature, there is relatively little discussion and guidance in general medical literature."

(Sir Liam Donaldson writing in Medicine, Science and the Law 1999; 39:11-16.)  

"Rapid growth in technology, an ageing population, higher public and patient expectations mean that health care today is not the same as health care even 10 years ago and won't be the same as health care in 10 and 20 years time."

(Sir Liam Donaldson speaking on the subject 'Healthcare Innovation' at the Sixth Annual Smithkline Beecham Science Policy Symposium, at the Royal College of Pathologists,Thursday 21 October 1999.)    

"For most of the life-time of the NHS the accountability of a surgeon or other clinician was to his or her individual patients and to a broad professional code. Practice was largely self-determined. Today a doctor has a range of new accountabilities arising, for example, from tighter more explicit professional standards, a duty to participate in continuing professional development and to the corporate goals of the service in which they work."

(Sir Liam Donaldson speaking at a conference on the development of surgical competence on clinical performance and priorities in the NHS, organised by The Smith & Nephew Foundation and The Royal College of Surgeons of England, at The Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre, Westminster, Tuesday 2 November 1999).   

"In the past, professionals have been assumed to be objective and impartial. Given the high stakes -financial and human - in many cases, this seems to place a heavy burden on the modern expert witness."

(Sir Liam Donaldson writing in Medicine, Science and the Law 1999; 39:11-16.)  

"Before these events in Cleveland, the problem of child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom had been debated largely in professional circles. Informed speculation at that time about the source of any future public crisis concerning the sexual abuse of children would surely have forecast a single case tragedy of the type which had all too frequently occurred in the non-accidental injury field. Instead, the issues which dominated the public debate were much broader and more complex. They were: whether there existed a serious problem of sexual abuse in society; the rights of parents; and the limits of the power of professionals who care for children."

(Sir Liam Donaldson writing in Journal of Public Health Medicine 1995; 17:70-6.)

"Important decisions about the organisation and development of services will always have to be taken because of changes in the degree of specialisation in clinical practice."

(Sir Liam Donaldson writing in the British Medical Journal 1992; 305:1280-4.)