- Blasted Heath Inquests Archived Message
Posted by Keith-264
on October 23, 2023, 2:09 pm
|
https://www.private-eye.co.uk/in-the-back Issue 1609 LATE REVIEW: Michael Heath carried out a number of questionable autopsies DISCREDITED pathologist Michael Heath, responsible for more than 20 years of botched autopsies and miscarriages of justice, has died ahead of what was to be his third medical disciplinary hearing, the Eye has learnt. Heath was due to face a lengthy medical practitioners tribunal in November, relating to a number of questionable autopsies carried out in recent years on behalf of the Oxford and Surrey coroners, when the already infamous pathologist was in his seventies. Now families affected by his work fear they may never learn the full truth about what happened to their loved ones. Eye readers may remember the case of former musician and teacher Deirdre Hicks, who Heath wrongly concluded had died from acute kidney injury and enteritis while in East Surrey hospital (Eye 1578). A fellow pathologist, who carried out a second post-mortem for the family, said Heath's 30-minute autopsy was "negligent". He had, among other failings, recorded that Mrs Hicks, 85, had a healthy gallbladder, when a congenital abnormality meant she did not have one at all. In an indication that Heath might have been copying and pasting his post-mortem reports, the family of Ann House, 74, a former social worker who also died in East Surrey hospital, say there were a series of anomalies – including mention of her gallbladder when it had been surgically removed years earlier. Alarm bells Of even more concern to the families, however, was that Heath was still practising despite years of repeated complaints of bungled work from fellow Home Office pathologists; an unprecedented investigation by the Criminal Cases Review Commission after he was involved in a number of miscarriages of justice; and previous adverse findings from the General Medical Council. Alarm bells should have been ringing as long ago as the early 1990s, when questions were raised about Heath's claims wrongly implicating Sheila Bowler in a murder by drowning of an ageing aunt. After four years in prison for a crime that never was, she was cleared. Other appalling failures followed. He was criticised for missing vital evidence when concluding in 2001 that Stuart Lubbock, 31, had died from drowning in Michael Barrymore's swimming pool. Steven Puaca and Kenneth Fraser were both wrongly jailed for killing their partners when one died from a drugs overdose and the other from a fall. The cases prompted formal complaints from five leading contemporaries, presaging Heath's resignation as a Home Office pathologist in 2006 after an adverse finding by its disciplinary tribunal. Three years later the same cases were examined by the General Medical Council's disciplinary panel, which found him guilty of serious misconduct but concluded he was fit to continue, on the basis that it was unlikely to happen again. The next year he was back before the GMC, facing allegations that he had wrongly recorded a "natural causes" death in the case of woman whose artery had been punctured by a surgeon. Broken system Yet it was not until 2021 that restrictions were imposed on Heath's licence to practise following the latest complaints from at least four families to the GMC. It's not known how many autopsies Heath had carried out over the years or how many complaints went to the regulator. "Given Dr Heath's history, it beggars belief that the GMC allowed him to continue working and that coroners were prepared to employ him," Mrs Hicks's daughter, Rebecca Rees, told the Eye. She added that although she was sorry for his family's loss, the halting of the GMC hearing because of his death meant she and other bereaved relatives would now not learn what went wrong and whether there was sufficient evidence to take any civil actions. She also criticised the length of time it had taken the GMC to investigate before finally referring the case to the tribunal: "The GMC had some serious questions to answer over their treatment of Dr Heath, and now with his death, they conveniently don't have to." The GMC said in a statement that "we understand this can be distressing for patients and families, who are anxious", but it declined to respond to her concerns, merely adding: "It is our usual policy to only confirm the publicly available information about individual doctors as it appears on the medical register. Prior to his death, Dr Heath was registered without a licence to practise." |
| Message Thread:
|