Scottish GP suspended for drugs misconduct in Falkirk

Published on Tuesday 4 August 2009 22:04

A SCOTTISH doctor has been suspended from the medical register for 12 months after prescribing drugs to patients and then trying to delete them from their records.

The General Medical Council, sitting in Manchester, heard that Dr Morven Gillespie had prescribed drugs, including Diazepam, sleeping pills and painkillers, to two patients.

While prescriptions were written for two patients – referred to as A and B – they were intended for the use of only one of them, the GMC was told.

The drugs were prescribed between February 2006 and July 2008 while Dr Gillespie was working as a locum GP at a practice in Falkirk.

The GMC panel also heard that the doctor did not tell other GPs at the practice about the prescriptions, and deleted entries from the computer records.

"The panel takes a very serious view of Dr Gillespie's premeditated and dishonest behaviour, which includes ill-judged prescribing and repeated attempts to remove the evidence," the GMC said.

The panel was told Dr Gillespie was no longer practising and would not be returning to the practice. But her application to be voluntarily erased from the register was not granted.

The panel concluded that her behaviour impaired her fitness to practise as a doctor.

Later, the panel decided that Dr Gillespie should be suspended from the medical register for 12 months.