GMC says consultant who removed healthy breast can carry on working

A consultant surgeon, found guilty yesterday of serious professional misconduct for removing a woman's breast unnecessarily, is being allowed to continue working.

A consultant surgeon, found guilty yesterday of serious professional misconduct for removing a woman's breast unnecessarily, is being allowed to continue working.

William Thomson was reprimanded by the General Medical Council professional conduct committee after admitting that he performed the surgery without doing a test to confirm his diagnosis of cancer. He told the hearing he felt "awful" when the tumour was later found to be benign. "I had injured the woman and I felt very responsible," he said.

Professor Peter Richards, chairman of the committee, said that although Mr Thomson had been guilty of serious professional misconduct, the committee was satisfied he was a competent, caring and highly conscientious surgeon. To restrict his work or remove him from the medical register was not in the public interest .

Cancer charities said it sent out the wrong message to women around the country and would add to public concern about doctors and surgeons. Delyth Morgan, chief executive of Breakthrough Breast Cancer, said: "This is an appalling case which must never be allowed to happen again. No woman should have to face the prospect of such a distressing experience. The GMC need to really think carefully about the message this sends to women when public confidence in their way of working at an all-time low."

During the hearing the committee was told that Mrs A, aged 44, from Lanarkshire, was referred to hospital after visiting her GP when she discovered a lump in her right breast on 29 October 1997. She arranged to see Mr Thomson at Hairmyres Hospital in East Kilbride, and he diagnosed cancer after a mammogram and ultrasound scan. He operated on 8 November without doing a pre-operative biopsy to confirm the diagnosis.

Mr Thomson claimed he acted quickly out of compassion for Mrs A because she was very worried. He said he had warned the woman there was a chance his first diagnosis was wrong and gave her the option of returning to the clinic for a biopsy. He said: "I should have said, 'Sorry, you have to come back on Monday', but I did it out of compassion."

The committee found him guilty of failing to obtain her consent for the operation but cleared him of making inappropriate and insensitive comments to her at a subsequent consultation when it was alleged he told her the loss of her breast was not as serious as divorce or losing a child.

Professor Richards said: "Whilst we accept that Mrs A was very anxious and expressed her wish to proceed with surgery as soon as possible, you should have persuaded her otherwise. You departed from the widely accepted practice in the field of breast surgery of employing all three elements of triple assessment, mammography, ultrasound and tissue diagnosis before undertaking a mastectomy."

During the hearing he told the committee he had operated on five women without pre-op biopsies in the previous nine months because their breast cancers were obvious. "My normal practice at the time was to follow triple assessment, even at the time of the previous [five] cases," he said. "The other cases were very obvious large or ulcerated cancers."

* Fifty more women have come forward fearing they may have been damaged after operations by Richard Neale, the consultant gynaecologist who was struck off the medical register last week for serious professional misconduct.