Dishonest medical boss suspended

THE bankrupt clinical director with one of Scotland's largest health authorities has been suspended from his post after being convicted of dishonesty by a General Medical Council panel.

Dr Stuart Scott, who is clinical director of health and informatics with NHS Grampian and a former deputy chairman of the BMA's Scottish GPs committee, kept payments which should have been paid into the account of the Aberdeen medical practice where he was partner.

A hearing of the GMC's fitness to practise panel was told that Dr Scott failed to inform his partners that he was facing bankruptcy and resorted to dishonesty in the "naive belief" that his "dire" financial situation could be rectified.

The panel ruled that Dr Scott's fitness to practise had been impaired and that his registration to practise should be suspended for a month, stating it was not necessary, in the public interest, to impose an immediate order.

But yesterday a spokeswoman for NHS Grampian said: "NHS Grampian have suspended Dr Scott with immediate effect to allow us to consider carefully the deliberations of the GMC fitness to practise panel."

The hearing was told that Dr Scott, 48, had entered into an agreement in 2006 with his fellow partners in the Holburn Medical Group which stipulated that he would cease to be a partner if he became bankrupt.

At the time he was working two days a week as the clinical director of eHealth for NHS Grampian and was also active on a number of British Medical Association committees for which he received honoraria payments.

Dr Scott had signed a declaration that any money he received from the BMA's General Practitioners Defence Fund to cover the cost of his absence would go into the practice's bank account. But, between August 2006 and December 2008, none of the payments he received were paid into the practice account.