The High Court has refused a judicial review challenge to the Medical Council of Ireland’s decision to remove a retired doctor from the medical register while it was considering whether to reopen a complaint against him.
Mr Justice Cian Ferriter ruled on 9 December 2021 that the complaint remained disposed of under the Medical Practitioners Act 2007 until the Council replaced its earlier decision with a fresh decision that there was sufficient cause for further action. The judge refused all the reliefs sought by James Hyland.
Hyland had complained to the Council in July 2018 about the care given to his late mother, Eileen Hyland, who died at Cork University Hospital in May 2017. The complaint alleged failings in her treatment for thyroid cancer, including that she was given external beam radiation rather than radioactive iodine treatment.
In April 2019, the Council’s Preliminary Proceedings Committee concluded there was no sufficient cause for further action, finding no prima facie evidence of professional misconduct or poor professional performance by the two consultants named in the complaint. The Council decided in May 2019 to take no further action.
Hyland later asked the Council to reopen the investigation, submitting additional medical records, expert opinions and other material. In June 2020, the committee decided to consider whether to reopen the complaint and invited the doctor to make submissions. Before that question was decided, the doctor applied in July 2020 to have his registration removed under section 52 of the Act.
The committee subsequently noted that the doctor had voluntarily withdrawn from the register and that the complaint against him could not be reopened because he was no longer a registered medical practitioner.
Hyland argued that the complaint was still live while the committee considered reopening it, and that the Council should not have allowed the doctor to leave the register before deciding that question. The Council argued that its 2019 decision remained in force unless and until it was replaced.
The judge accepted that the Council had an implied power to revisit a previously rejected complaint if new material warranted doing so. But he held that merely considering whether to reopen the complaint did not undo the earlier decision. At the time of the doctor’s removal application, the Council had not made a fresh decision finding sufficient cause for further action.
The judge also rejected the argument that Hyland’s 2020 submission was a separate complaint. It concerned the same underlying allegations and supplied further evidence in support of the original complaint, he found.
The court therefore concluded that the Council had not acted unlawfully in acceding to the doctor’s application to have his registration removed. It refused the requested declarations and orders, including an order directing the Council to continue the investigation.