KEY POINTS:
A Hawkes Bay surgeon found guilty of professional misconduct after a botched breast-reduction operation appealed to the High Court yesterday to have his name permanently suppressed.
The Medical Disciplinary Tribunal this year found the surgeon guilty of misconduct and refused name suppression.
He was fined $5000 and ordered to pay costs totalling $15,000.
The 37-year-old complainant went to the doctor in February 2005 to have her breasts reduced from a 20GG bra size to a D-cup.
A week later she found her left breast leaking blood and a "runny brown, smelly discharge".
She told the tribunal hearing that despite assurances from the surgeon, her breasts remained sore and she wondered if they were "rotting off".
She went back to the surgeon for several appointments and each time he cut away "dead flesh".
He reassured her the healing would take time and that she should "look to the future".
Yesterday, the surgeon's lawyer, Jonathan Krebs, told the High Court at Napier that the surgeon planned to retire.
He said his client had diabetes and high blood pressure, and had become depressed.
The tribunal fined, censured, and put restrictions on the surgeon but did not suspend or strike him off the medical register.
Mr Krebs said suppression of the surgeon's name would notcompromise transparency because the case had been widely publicised.
While the tribunal felt publication of the surgeon's name would be a protection for future patients, this argument had been "considerably watered down" by his client's decision to retire.
Opposing yesterday's appeal for name suppression, the director of proceedings for the Health and Disability Commissioner, Theo Baker, said there was clearly a public interest in naming the surgeon.
There was also the issue of impugning other surgeons who worked in Hawkes Bay.
"Prospective patients in Hawkes Bay must be reluctant to approach any surgeon for breast reductions because they do not know who the surgeon is," she said.
The state of the surgeon's health was not new because he had told the tribunal he was insulin-dependent
Justice Christopher Allan reserved his decision on the appeal and continued the interim suppression order.
- NZPA
