Informed Consent
Agreement to treatment given after understanding its benefits, risks and alternatives.
What it means
Informed consent is agreement to treatment given with an adequate understanding of what it involves, what it is likely to achieve, what could go wrong, and what the alternatives are — including doing nothing.
Three elements are required: the person must have capacity to decide, the decision must be voluntary, and they must be adequately informed.
Since the Montgomery judgment in 2015, UK law requires disclosure of risks that this particular patient would consider significant — not merely those a doctor considers important.
In practice
A signed form documents consent; it does not constitute it. Consent is the conversation, not the signature.
Consent can be withdrawn at any time, including after signing and up to the moment a procedure begins.
Why it matters
Four questions are worth asking before any treatment: What are the benefits? What are the risks? What are the alternatives? What happens if I do nothing?
The last is asked least and matters most, because for a great many conditions doing nothing is a legitimate option with its own known outcome.
This applies to what we sell as much as to anything else. A test or treatment you did not fully understand before buying was not properly consented, and we would rather explain it twice than sell it once.
Clinically reviewed by Dr Mohammad Zubair Khan, GMC 7563469
Last reviewed
August 30, 2026