A dermatologist facing more than 100 allegations of professional misconduct and/or poor professional performance told a Medical Council fitness-to-practise committee yesterday that the risk to his teenage patient from going on a sun bed was “negligible”.
Dr Adam Jacobus Smith (65), of the Whitfield Clinic, Waterford, is facing allegations in connection with his treatment of 12 patients.
Twelve allegations relate to Patient E, a 17-year-old schoolboy suffering from guttate psoriasis, on or about August 2008. Dr Smith said he gave the boy permission to attend a tanning parlour for treatment of his psoriasis only after the boy, accompanied by his mother, raised the issue. The boy and his mother reject Dr Smith’s contention that they suggested using a sun bed rather than await a referral for specialist UVB treatment.
Of expert witness testimony that identified a small risk of cancer associated with even a short course of sun bed use, Dr Smith said: “I gave him permission to go for four exposures . . . It would be a negligible risk if any,” he said.
Of an allegation he failed to do blood tests before prescribing methotrexate, a treatment one expert witness said had “a severe risk of fatal or toxic reaction”, Dr Smith said he didn’t think he put the patient “at any special risk” in prescribing it for six weeks.
The hearing resumes on Thursday.
