A CONSULTANT gynaecologist suspended by the Medical Council for a year over treatment provided by her to seven patients, including a woman who later died, has brought a High Court appeal against the penalty.
Dr Andrea Hermann was reported to the council over the care she provided to seven patients at the privately run Galway Clinic, Doughiska, near Galway city, between February 2005 and November 2008.
A Medical Council Fitness to Practise Committee (FtPC) held an inquiry, which began last October and ran over 20 days, with both public and private sessions.
The FtPC later recommended she be suspended for a year with conditions on her future work and that decision was confirmed by the Medical Council.
Yesterday, the High Court was told Dr Hermann is appealing against the sanctions imposed on her but was not challenging the facts.
After being told the appeal may take up to two days, the president of the High Court, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns, said he would list it in the court list to fix hearing dates.
During the FtPC inquiry, the only allegations heard in public related to two of the seven patients over which complaints were made. The other five cases were heard in private.
The FtPC found her guilty of professional misconduct in relation to her treatment of three of the seven patients.
She admitted to the FtPC her treatment amounted to professional misconduct in relation to Saundra O’Connor (39) from Claregalway, Co Galway, who developed septic shock after a procedure carried out by Dr Hermann in 2005. Ms O’Connor subsequently spent almost three years in a vegetative state before she died in February 2008.The FtPC found her guilty of professional misconduct in this case.
The second case heard in public related to her treatment of a 39-year-old woman with haemophilia who also had to be admitted to a public hospital after Dr Hermann operated on her on March 26th, 2008. Dr Hermann was not found guilty of professional misconduct in this case.
Meanwhile, the reserved judgment of the Medical Council’s FtPC in Dr Hermann’s case, which has just been released, provides details of the conditions which it wished to attach to the retention of her name on the medical register.
It says that on completion of her one-year period of suspension, she “must confine her medical practice to working in hospitals in which there are at least three other gynaecologists who are on the specialist register”.
It also recommended she work with a person acceptable to the Medical Council to formulate a personal professional development plan “specifically designed to address the deficiencies” in her gynaecological surgical techniques during her year of suspension.
While she was found guilty of professional misconduct in just three of the seven cases the FtPC found she seriously fell short of the standards expected from a consultant gynaecologist in respect of the totality of the treatment afforded to all seven patients.
But it said none of the actions of Dr Hermann was wilful “and must be taken in the context in which she was working including working as a sole gynaecologist without the option of peer review by colleagues”.
“The committee also took into account aspects of the governance and procedures in the Galway Clinic which may have had an impact on Dr Hermann’s practice.”