A Kildare-based general practitioner is alleged to have changed a female patient’s thyroid medication without engaging adequately with other medical practitioners, a fitness-to-practise committee has heard.
Dr Neville Wilson of the Harbour Medical Centre, Kilcock, had a consultation on June 24th, 2021, with a female patient, the complainant, who was diagnosed with Graves’ disease in 2012.
The disease, a type of hyperthyroidism, is a chronic autoimmune disorder where antibodies stimulate the thyroid to overproduce hormones. It can cause anxiety, tremor, heat intolerance and weight loss.
It is alleged that Wilson, who did not attend the inquiry and was not represented, implemented an inappropriate treatment plan in respect of the patient’s thyroid disorder.
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It is alleged that he implemented this treatment plan without engaging at all with the patient’s previous medical team or records.
It is also alleged that Wilson implemented the plan without obtaining the patient’s appropriate medical records in connection with previous treatment of her thyroid disorder over the years.
The patient told the committee that prior to attending Wilson, she had been taking neo-mercazole, a brand name for carbimazole, to treat an overactive thyroid.
She said Wilson felt her condition was acute rather than chronic, that she potentially had hashitoxicosis and that he prescribed NP Thyroid for six months.
NP Thyroid is a natural medication derived from pig thyroid glands and is used to treat hypothyroidism, an underactive thyroid condition.
Hashitoxicosis is the initial hyperthyroid phase of patients with a type of autoimmune disorder that leads to hypothyroidism.
The patient said she attended Wilson, on the recommendation of two people, as she wished to try the functional medicine route before considering the options of radio-iodine treatment or substantial removal of her thyroid.
However, that autumn, some of her symptoms of an overactive thyroid – including being anxious, tired and agitated – returned, and she explained this to Wilson at a further consultation in November.
Wilson reduced the dose of NP Thyroid from two tablets to one and-a-half tablets daily, the patient said, but her symptoms worsened.
Ultimately she returned to O’Flaherty’s practice, her previous GP, where a doctor there put her back on neo-mercazole and beta blockers, which slow the heart rate.
Eoghan O’Sullivan, barrister for the chief executive of the Medical Council, Dr Maria O’Kane, said numerous items of correspondence had been sent to Wilson informing him of the hearings on Thursday, and in February.
However, Wilson, who has been registered since 2004, informed the Medical Council that he had retired and resigned from the Medical Council, and would not be attending the inquiry.
The inquiry was adjourned in February, as the committee was not satisfied that the registrant was fully aware that, even though he had resigned from the Medical Council, this did not mean he was removed from the general register.
Once a doctor who is the subject of fitness-to-practise proceedings remains on the register, they remain under the jurisdiction of the fitness-to-practise committee, the inquiry heard.
The inquiry also heard that only in limited circumstances can a doctor who is the subject of fitness-to-practise proceedings apply to the Medical Council to be removed from the register.
In the majority of such cases, the fitness-to-practise proceedings continue to a conclusion.
The committee considered again on Thursday whether Wilson had been served with notice of the inquiry, and found that he had. Members were satisfied to proceed in his absence, which they found to be “deliberate and voluntary”.
Wilson was found guilty of professional misconduct in December 2024 by a fitness-to-practise committee over his failure to wear a mask at his clinic during the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as allowing a poster containing false and misleading information about Covid vaccines in his surgery.
The committee of the current inquiry will reconvene at a future date to hear evidence from the expert witness for the chief executive of the Medical Council.
