Doctor struck off over sex charge

A doctor has been struck off for having a sexual relationship with a woman who was his patient. She was also his receptionist - and his stepdaughter.

The man, "Dr N" in court documents, began having sex with his wife's daughter when she was in her early 30s. She had become part of his family when she was 13.

Dr N and "Mrs U" now live together and have had two children.

The case went to the Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal in Wellington last year - and later to the High Court - after a complaint from the woman's father-in-law.

In a victim impact statement summarised in the tribunal's decision, the father-in-law said Dr N had lied to the family. His actions had destroyed his son's marriage and ruined his family's lives.

"He stated ... Dr N saw an opportunity to exploit a dysfunctional situation at a time when Mrs U was under extreme stress ... while his son was trying to save his marriage. "They were not the actions of a responsible doctor and step-father ... Dr N had crossed every professional boundary to fulfil his selfish sexual needs."

The court suppressed all names in the case to protect the children of Dr N, Mr U, Mrs U and her mother Mrs N.

Dr N admitted professional misconduct to the tribunal, but appealed unsuccessfully to the court against being struck off, arguing instead for the lighter penalty of suspension.

The stepdaughter became Dr N's patient in 1999 and his receptionist in 2002, the year she married Mr U. She had a child in 2003.

Her sexual relationship with Dr N began in May, 2007. They had become close as she cared for him after he suffered an injury. The next year both their marriages ended and they began to live together.

Dr N said Mrs U initiated their first sexual encounter. She walked into his consulting room during a lunch break and performed oral sex on him. Their first sexual intercourse occurred in a motel in the same month.

"Thereafter Dr N and Mrs U had sexual intercourse at the [name-suppressed] medical practice outside of surgery hours, in cars and in motel rooms."

Dr N's lawyer, Harry Waalkens QC, argued in court that the morals of a doctor having a sexual relationship with his adult stepdaughter were not a significant factor when considering the penalty for sex with a patient.

He said Mrs U was not a vulnerable person. But Justice Ronald Young strongly disagreed.

"She was the appellant's stepdaughter, his employee and his patient," the judge said.

"She was having a sexual relationship with her mother's husband, who had been in loco parentis to her for a number of years when she was a teenager. Clearly she would have been vulnerable to Dr N because of that relationship alone."

The judge accepted the sexual relationship did not grow exclusively from her being his patient, but said when combined, her "three vulnerabilities" as stepdaughter, employee and patient reinforced the power imbalance between them and increased Dr N's culpability.

Unrelated to the sexual matters, Dr N was being monitored by the Medical Council from 2007.

It had imposed conditions on his practice, which the tribunal said were "needed to prevent serious harm to the public", but he had failed to comply with those putting him on a path to becoming a specialist GP, leading to an additional charge at the tribunal.