Top plastic surgeon struck off medical register
A top plastic surgeon from Dudley has been struck off the medical register after a disciplinary panel upheld allegations of "sexually motiv- ated, improper and inappropriate" actions with six patients over a period of 13 years.
A top plastic surgeon from Dudley has been struck off the medical register after a disciplinary panel upheld allegations of "sexually motiv- ated, improper and inappropriate" actions with six patients over a period of 13 years.
Aivar Bracka had been cleared of indecent assault charges by a jury. However the General Medical Council launched its own investigation into the allegations and, following a month-long hearing in Manchester, erased Bracka from the register.
He had been allowed to return to Dudley's Russells Hall Hospital briefly following his trial at Wolverhampton Crown Court but was later suspended. He had featured in the television documentary Trust Me, I'm a Doctor in the late 1990s but his career was in ruins today.
The panel ruled Bracka, an "internationally recognised leader in his field, committed serious misconduct during consultations with patients in the course of his work as a specialist in corrective surgery for genital deformity.
The allegations spanned from 1987 to 2000 while Bracka, of Balmoral Road, Wordsley, was working at The Wordsley Hospital.
Striking him off the register, the General Medical Council said Bracka's actions were "a gross abuse of trust" patients had placed in him. He had "breached fundamental tenets of the medical profession" and posed a risk to patients.
A statement continued: "The panel has weighed the gravity of Dr Bracka's misconduct, and the risk to patients and the public inter- est, with his own interests and with the public interest in not depriving patients of an otherwise useful medical professional, indeed an internationally recognised leader in his field.
"The panel is satisfied that Dr Bracka's conduct is fundamentally incompatible with his continuing to be a registered medical practitioner. The panel has determined that Dr Bracka's sexually motivated, improper and inappropriate actions towards Patients A to F, which were opportunistic rather than predatory, were a gross abuse of the trust which they placed in him."
Bracka was found not guilty of six counts of indecent assault on five patients, including teenagers, at the former Wordsley Hospital following a five-week trial.
