NZ Doctor struck off for misconduct

Mar 29 2010

By Candy Lashkari

While all names have been suppressed to protect the identities of those involved, the case has caught the imagination of the media. “Dr N” who admitted to professional misconduct before the Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal was reported to have appealed to the High Court against being struck off by The Weekend Herald on Saturday. The appeal was unsuccessful.

The doctor had a sexual relationship with a female patient, who incidentally was working for him as a receptionist and also happened to be his stepdaughter. He was also living with her and their two children. He has been struck of the medical register for this behavior and was censured.

The man known only as “Dr N” in court documents began a sexual relationship with the woman known as “Mrs. U” when she was in her early 30s. She had been part of his family since she was 13 years old, when he was married to her mother. She became his patient in 1999 and his receptionist in 2002, the year she married” Mr. U”. She was also his caretaker after he suffered an injury for a short while.

The case was brought to the attention of the Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal in Wellington last year and then to the High Court , after a complaint from the woman's father-in-law. The father of “Mr. U” claimed that “Dr N saw an opportunity to exploit a dysfunctional situation at a time when Mrs U was under extreme stress ... while his son was trying to save his marriage. ”

"They were not the actions of a responsible doctor and step-father ... Dr N had crossed every professional boundary to fulfil his selfish sexual needs." Said the father in law of” Mrs. U”. Their sexual relationship began in May 2007, with “Dr N” claiming that “Mrs. U” initiated the first sexual encounter.

It was in the consulting room during lunch break that she performed oral sex on him. The first sexual intercourse happened in a motel in the same month. There after the affair continued in the clinic, in cars, and motel rooms.

Dr N’s layer Hary Waalkens QC argued that “Mrs. U” was not a vulnerable person, however Justice Ronald Young disagreed. Young stated “She was the appellant's stepdaughter, his employee and his patient. She was having a sexual relationship with her mother's husband, who had been in loco parentis to her for a number of years when she was a teenager. Clearly she would have been vulnerable to Dr N because of that relationship alone.”

This increased her vulnerability and the doctor’s culpability as it reinforced the power imbalance between them. Thus the Judge was not convinced that the doctor had not exploited the vulnerabilities of the woman as a patient, employee, stepdaughter and caretaker.