The revelation that a psychiatrist was able to practice in the Republic, while suspended from the medical register in Britain, is disturbing. Amid claims and counter claims by the authority who employed the doctor here - the South Eastern Health Board (SEHB) - and the body with a statutory obligation to protect the public interest - the Medical Council - the fact remains that patients in the State were treated by a consultant against whom serious allegations of professional misconduct had been made.
The doctor concerned has since been struck off the British medical register on the basis of having "an approach to practice and an attitude to patients which have no place in medicine". Yet, the same medical practitioner was able to secure two separate periods of employment as a locum consultant psychiatrist in two different hospitals administered by the SEHB between April and November, 2000. The General Medical Council in the UK informed its Irish counterpart of the doctor's initial suspension on March 29th, 2000. The Medical Council here says it only became aware that the consultant was practicing in the State in July, 2000, which the SEHB disputes.
Whatever about the exact sequence of events, a vulnerable group of people - patients with psychological illness - was exposed to the professional care of a doctor already under the gravest suspicion. How could this happen, and more importantly, what can be done to ensure patients' safety in the State? To an outside observer, it seems incomprehensible that the Medical Council does not have a system of alerting health boards and hospitals when it is informed of a suspension by its UK counterpart.
The SEHB cannot escape blame either. Given that this psychiatrist's CV would have referred to employers in Britain, it would seem that little or no effort was made to contact them, at which point his unacceptable professional behaviour would have come to light. Despite expressing annoyance at the actions of the Medical Council in this affair, the Minister for Health must also shoulder some responsibility. He has continuously delayed publication of a new Medical Practitioners' Act; the 1978 Act is out of date and ineffective.
New legislation - by defining more clearly the responsibilities of the Medical Council - would make it almost impossible for the unfortunate events in the SEHB to be replicated. New legislation would also allow greater lay representation on the Medical Council at a time when public confidence in its abilities is at an-all-time low.