Doctor used hospital equipment as sex aid

By STEPHEN COOK

A gynaecologist struck off in Britain after allegedly having sex with a patient while hooked up to an ultrasound machine has returned home to New Zealand.

Euan Laird, formerly of Blenheim, was employed as a senior house officer in obstetrics and gynaecology at Oxford's John Radcliffe Hospital when he allegedly began a six-year relationship with a patient.

Their involvement, including his alleged use of hospital equipment to improve their sexual encounters, continued until 1997.

Records of a General Medical Council hearing say the pair met in hospital doctors' rooms and at her home. They also allegedly had sex in operating theatres.

The woman, identified only as Mrs N, eventually complained to the council, who charged Laird with inappropriate conduct, abuse of his professional position and acting in a manner liable to bring the profession into disrepute.

He was also accused of using hospital equipment for his own sexual gratification.

He denied the allegations, but was struck off the British medical register last month after it was decided he had overstepped the boundaries between doctor and patient.

The middle-aged father-of-three has now returned to New Zealand and is living in Nelson. He gave a firm "no comment" when the Herald asked him about Mrs N's claims or whether he would be seeking to practise in New Zealand.

Medical Council spokesman George Symmes said Laird had not yet applied for registration in New Zealand.

The hearing in London was told Laird and Mrs N met in 1990 before the birth of Mrs N's second child. They allegedly first had sex after arranging to meet at Headington's Churchill Hospital, on May 25, 1991. The affair continued until 1997.

Mrs N said sex had occurred in operating theatres.

"He put jelly on my stomach and used the ultrasound so he could see himself having sex with me," she said.

Laird denied serious professional misconduct and described the allegations as malicious and deeply upsetting.

However, the council rejected the denial, saying forming a relationship with a gynaecological patient was a clear abuse of his professional position.

After leaving school Laird studied agriculture at Lincoln University and spent several years farming before making the career change to medicine. He studied at Otago before becoming a registrar at Christchurch Women's Hospital in 1984, specialising in obstetrics and gynaecology.

In 1987 he took up a six-month exchange visit to John Radcliffe Hospital.

He rose to the position of registrar before moving to Northampton General Hospital and then Banbury Hospital, where he made headlines in 2001 when he was in charge of the successful delivery of twins to a 56-year-old - making her the oldest birth mother of twins in history.