SYDNEY:  A former senior male oncologist, John Henry KEARSLEY, who drugged and indecently assaulted a junior female registrar has had his minimum jail term slashed by nearly two-thirds on appeal after a court took into account his “extraordinary” contribution to the medical profession and good standing in the community.

KEARSLEY, 65, will be eligible for parole in May 2017 — 18 months sooner than mandated under his original sentence.

A reason given for the sentence reduction was his outstanding medical career. Good grief!

According to the agreed facts, the then-director of radiation oncology at Sydney’s St. George Hospital invited his young colleague to his house in November 2013 and proceeded to spike her drink with lorazepam.

When she complained of dizziness, he suggested she lie on his couch for a “relaxation exercise”.  She later awoke on a bed in a guest room to find him massaging her back and kissing her breast.

KEARSLEY pleaded guilty to using an intoxicating substance to commit an indictable offence, and assault with an act of indecency, and was sentenced in August 2016 to a minimum of two years and three months in jail, with a maximum of four years and three months.

During sentencing, the court was read an impact statement from the victim detailing how the incident had left her with post-traumatic stress and unable to trust her colleagues.

“My world is broken and it will never be the same,” she wrote.

The 3 judges placed emphasis on Mr KEARSLEY’s “powerful subjective circumstances” leading up to the crime, which included “extreme stress”, a deteriorating relationship with his wife and heavy drinking.

Justice Robert Macfarlan stressed that it was relevant to consider Mr KEARSLEY had “lost his profession, his position of good standing in the community, and has been the subject of adverse media publicity”.  He noted that Mr KEARSLEY “had rendered extraordinary service to the medical profession, and, through it, to the community at large”.

The court also heard Mr KEARSLEY was not coping well in jail given that he was an “older person of a professional background” and his mental health was deteriorating rapidly.  So he should be spared from being unable to cope?

The judges were split as to whether criminal Mr KEARSLEY should receive jail time at all.  Unbelievable!

Justice Ian Harrison argued Mr KEARSLEY’s sentence should be suspended because it would be “starkly disproportionate to the criminality of the offences in question”, especially when taking into account Mr KEARSLEY’s “entirely blemish-free record and impressive life of community service”.

But his two fellows held that a custodial sentence, although reduced, was appropriate given the nature of the offending.

KEARSLEY’s medical registration has been suspended.  Is that the big punishment?  Not in the public’s view.

MEAG COMMENT: Unbelievable. …’good standing in the community’! ‘impressive life of community service’, so what?  The abuse of trust of his position should have resulted in harsher penalty, both as punishment of the perpetrator and a deterrent to others.  What about the registrar, Your Honour?  

Fake doctors, fake nurses, fake science, fake reports, fake evidence …fake this, that, and the other.  Fakes all round.  What’s next?

Man who allegedly pretended to be doctor worked in NSW hospitals for over a decade

By David Marchese

ABC News Australia

Wed 8 Mar 2017, 7:45am

A man is facing a $30,000 fine after allegedly masquerading as a doctor at New South Wales hospitals for more than a decade.

Key points:

• Shyam Acharya is accused of stealing an Indian doctor’s identity before posing as a doctor in Australia
• Mr Acharya worked in NSW from 2003 with only one complaint ever registered
• NSW Health has defended the department’s recruitment practices

Shyam Acharya is accused of stealing a doctor’s name and medical qualifications while in India before moving to Australia and becoming a citizen.

To find work in Australia, he allegedly used fraudulent documents to gain registration with the Medical Council of New South Wales in 2003.

Mr Acharya worked at MANLY, HORNSBY, WYONG and GOSFORD hospitals under the name Sarang CHITALE up until 2014.

As a junior doctor, he was under the supervision of other clinicians and NSW Health ,said one clinical incident involving a team Mr Acharya worked in was reported.

Medical Council did not receive complaints

Medical Error Action Group founder Lorraine Long said it was unclear what work Mr Acharya had been carrying out.

“If he’s working in a hospital, what was he actually doing in the hospital?” she said.

“I mean he had to have been conducting medical procedures of some sort.

“You couldn’t work in a hospital for that long and … not do any procedure.    I find that hard to believe.”

However, NSW Health’s deputy secretary Karen Crawshaw said no complaints were received by the Medical Council of NSW or the Health Care Complaints Commission.

This is the NSW Ministry of Health’s excuse!  No complaints!

READ FULL STORY

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-07/doctors-identity-allegedly-stolen-and-used-in-nsw-hospitals/8332812

NEWCASTLE, New South Wales

A doctor accused of more than 100 sex offences against 81 people, most of whom were patients, over a 27-year period, will go on trial that is expected to last six months.

Immunologist Dr Jeremy Michael Stafford COLEMAN, has been ordered to stand trial in May 2017 of 130 charges of indecent and sexual assaults at his Newcastle practice.

READ MORE:

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/4345159/doctors-130-sex-charges/

SYDNEY:  Notorious former gynaecologist Graeme Reeves “made a mistake” when he misdiagnosed a seriously ill new mother but does not deserve criminal punishment, his barrister says.

Dubbed the “Butcher of Bega” after being convicted of sexual assault, indecent assault, mutilation of a woman’s genitals and pleading guilty to fraud, the deregistered doctor is now on trial charged with manslaughter over the death of a female patient more than 20 years ago.

Mrs Kerry Ann McAllister, 38, died from septicaemia after she gave birth to her third son in The Hills Private Hospital (then known as Baulkham Hills Private Hospital) in May 1996.

In his opening address in the NSW District Court on Friday, prosecutor David Price said a “reasonably competent” obstetrician could have diagnosed Mrs McAllister as having a bacterial virus.

“His failure to take steps to appropriately investigate Kerry’s condition and his failure to assume and treat for bacterial infection was a gross deviation from the standard of care of a reasonably confident obstetrician,” Mr Price said.

“It seems evident that Kerry had a bacterial infection from the outset … If Dr Reeves had acted in a different manner it is highly likely that Kerry would have received appropriate treatment much earlier.”

The court heard that Reeves maintained that Mrs McAllister had a viral infection and had repeatedly brushed off the concerns nurses had about her increasing temperature and pain.

It was only after Reeves saw the results of the blood tests ordered by another doctor that he organised for Mrs McAllister to be transferred to Westmead Hospital where she died the next day.

The court heard that Mrs McAllister had complained of a painful throat and congested lungs and hip and legs.

There is expected to be evidence that when Mrs McAllister arrived at Westmead Hospital she was left in limbo and transferred to a ward not appropriate for a critically ill patient.

Reeves was found guilty by a District Court jury in 2011 for maliciously inflicting grievous bodily harm with intent after he surgically removed the clitoris and labia of a patient without her consent during an operation to take out a pre-cancerous lesion.  He was also found guilty by judge alone trial of sexually assaulting another patient.

The trial continues in the District Court, Sydney.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-24/doctor-graeme-reeves-in-court-after-patient-dies-of-septicaemia/8301662

SKINNER skinned.  Yes, the NSW Health Minister for Health the Hon Jillian Skinner MP – Queen of Health Cover-Ups – has quit.

Couldn’t hack a sacking or the parliamentary back bench.  Too humiliating for her?  Tut tut, she’s displayed what we knew she was made of…. cardboard. Dishonest before entering the health portfolio and dishonest exiting it.

What about all those patients who were injured and killed in HER health system? They copped “Jillian justice”…cover-up, discrimination, platitudes.  She favoured clinicians and left patients for dead.

No backbone, no depth of character.  Now she’s off with her bat and ball to cause a by-election in her North Shore electorate instead of working for her constituents to the next state election in 2019. What a sore loser!

As for claiming she mentored the new NSW Premier, God help us, New South Wales could be in for even bigger cover-ups.

There was no way for Federal Health Minister The Hon Sussan Ley MP would recover from rorting taxpayer funds for her travel expenses.

While spending time, with the compliments of our taxes, supporting political party donors she forgot that constituents come first, not party donors.

The letter MEAG wrote on 23 December 2016 is what is called “the death-knell letter to health ministers”.  It works every time.

When will Australia get a health minister who addresses the important and pressing issues affecting, in this instance 20,000, patients?

FEDERAL Health Minister Sussan Ley received our letter on December 23, 2016, about Australia’s worst medical treatment scandals – tainted blood.

Where is the Government’s apology to Australia’s tainted blood victims, Prime Minister?  Is the Government waiting until every patient who contracted tainted blood from the Red Cross to die?

While politicians have time and diligence to fiddle their expense accounts, the public wait in vain for correspondence to be answered, i.e. to do their job.  This is why the public are fed up with politicians, well and truly.

Attend to our correspondence, Minister Ley.  It’s your morals versus ours.  What’s it going to be, Minister?

Read more of Fairfax Media Joanne McCarthy’s story:

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/4395914/sussan-ley-challenged-on-morals/

Something sus about Sussan – FED Health Minister The Hon Sussan LEY

What is it with our health politicians?  They’re all a bunch of duds.

We have NSW’s Jillian SKINNER MP riding by helicopter here and there but suffering ongoing memory loss when asked to explain why she was rorting the taxpayers’ piggy bank —  politicians think is their pocket money but it is theft  — now the Federal health minister Sussan LEY is at it, amongst many of their ilk. “It’s in the rules” is their cry when caught.  But don’t they declare to conduct themselves honestly when taking the ministerial oath?  That is, the Ministerial Code of (mis)Conduct.

LEY claimed to be meeting “stakeholders” on Queensland’s Gold Coast.   Which real estate agents were they?

She can’t abide by the rules of the Senate and apologise to tainted blood victims of Australia’s worst medical treatment disaster but she can find time to hire a chauffeur to be driven to to the Gold Coast and engage in property dealings using our taxes to get there and taking her boyfriend along with her.  Oh, “we the taxpayers” paid for him too.

Australia, be angry.  This is not good enough.  The calibre of our representatives stinks.

ATTENTION LADIES!

Women with breast implants are at a greater risk of a rare cancer form than once thought, Australian health authorities have warned.

The Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) reported an increased risk of Anaplastic Large Cell Lymphoma (ALCL) associated with breast implants.  Previously the risk was estimated between one in three million to one in 50,000.

The TGA now puts the risk between one in 10,000 and one in 1,000 and has confirmed 46 cases of breast implant-associated cancer rates in Australia, including 3 that were fatal.

Heed the warning.