Slimming doctor's drug ban

But Dr Sudesh Madan now faces a list of conditions including a ban on prescribing drugs and any involvement in the operation or management of slimming clinics. And a health watchdog said she would find it difficult to get a job as a result.

Dr Madan was banned from practising as a doctor by the General Medical Council (GMC) for 18 months in November last year after an investigation by the Lancashire Evening Telegraph into her clinics at the County Hotel, Blackburn.

The interim ban, pending a full hearing, came after she was alleged to be selling the unlicensed slimming drug Duromine.

Duromine is a drug similar to amphetamine, which suppresses the appetite and may cause heart problems and fits. The interim committee of the GMC decided Dr Madan was a possible risk to the public and suspended her from the medical register, but a review board has now decided to lift the suspension and replace it with a list of conditions.

These include barring Dr Madan from prescribing any drugs or from taking part in the operation or management of any slimming clinics.

She is free to apply for clinical jobs in the NHS, but must inform any potential employer and the GMC of her actions. The conditions will apply until a full hearing into Dr Madan's case, which is due to be held before the GMC's Professional Conduct Committee at their headquarters in London, beginning on October 22. It is expected to last for up to two weeks.

The GMC today confirmed that Dr Madan had been put back on the register and said reviews of cases were standard practice. Before her suspension Dr Madan was based at the Look Right health, beauty and slimming clinic in Eccleston, St Helens, but ran regular slimming clinics at the Blackburn hotel and throughout the North West.

A spokesman for the St Helens and Knowsley Community Health NHS Trust said: "Dr Madan left our employment on November 21, 2000. Since she is no longer in our employment we have no comment to make. Any question of her ability to practise as a doctor is a matter for the General Medical Council."

Andrew Stott, 38, of Sandycroft, near Chester, who claimed he suffered a heart attack a month after he was given Duromine by Dr Madan at a slimming clinic last year, today said he was confident that the GMC knew what they were doing.

His sister, Marie Stephenson, who works in a doctor's pharmacy said she was looking forward to the inquiry so that the whole truth about Duromine and its effects could be exposed.

The drug was banned after the Medicines Control Agency decided the risks outweighed the benefits of weight loss. Before the Lancashire Evening Telegraph investigation, the agency sent guidelines to GPs, pharmacists and diet specialists saying no new patients should be prescribed the drug and existing patients should be weaned off it.

Nigel Robinson, chief officer of the Blackburn, Hyndburn and Ribble Valley Community Health Council said: "I think it could be that she will find it hard to get a job in the health service. The criteria she is under should alleviate any concern, but first and foremost she has to get a job, and then she would be under supervision by a doctor. If they felt there was a risk they wouldn't have lifted the suspension."

The full list of conditions imposed on Dr Madan, which will remain in place until May 2002, reads:

You shall confine your practice to NHS Clinical Health posts

You shall not prescribe any drugs

You shall not associate in any way with the operation or management of any slimming clinics

You shall notify the Interim Orders Committee Secretariat of any posts requiring registration with the GMC for which you apply at the time of application and of any such posts which you undertake

You shall notify all employers, prospective employers and locum agencies, whether for paid or voluntary employment requiring registration with the GMC at the time of application of the matters which have been referred for inquiry by the GMC's Professional Conduct Committee and of these conditions. Dr Madan was unavailable for comment.