Former patient alleges psychiatrist assaulted her

EDMONTON — The Alberta College of Physicians and Surgeons is reviewing a complaint filed by a former patient of a psychiatrist now practising at the military base in Cold Lake.

Dr. James Bernard Hanley, 72, was stripped of medical licences in Newfoundland and Labrador and New Brunswick in 2007 after admitting he had sex with the patient.

Kathleen Wiseman told Postmedia News she has provided a statement to authorities alleging she was assaulted and denying she was ever engaged in a relationship with Hanley, who was granted a licence in Alberta last spring.

Wiseman said authorities in Alberta contacted her last month and requested the statement, which was to have been delivered this week to Dr. Trevor Theman, the registrar of the college.

Barb Krahn, a communications adviser for the college, said legislation prevents the regulator from speaking about any specific case except after a formal hearing. She said the only information available about Hanley is published on the college website, which says he is allowed to see patients as long as another regulated health professional is present.

Hanley had his privileges reinstated in Newfoundland and Labrador in 2011 under the condition that he agree not to see patients in private. At the time his licence was stripped in New Brunswick, he was seeing patients at the Canadian Forces Base in Gagetown — despite agreeing that he would not practise elsewhere while the case against him was being heard in Newfoundland.

A 52-year-old cancer survivor who has depression, Wiseman was shocked last month when she learned Hanley was working in Alberta. In her statement to the college, she said she had been his patient for 17 years before the first assault in 2003, and alleges another occurred the following year. In between that time, he repeatedly called her at home, work and on her cellphone, Wiseman said.

“It is about behaviour, and his behaviour proves he is a predator,” Wiseman said in her statement.

She has nightmares about what happened, “and I never feel safe,” she said in the statement.

“It is always in the back of my mind.”

Hanley did not respond to several attempts to reach him at Cold Lake, after which a public affairs officer requested future queries be directed to the Department of Defence.

On Tuesday, a media liaison in Ottawa directed questions back to the Alberta College of Physicians and Surgeons.

Earlier, a spokeswoman for the college said certificates of professional conduct are obtained from previous jurisdictions when a doctor applies for a licence in Alberta.

The registrar at the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New Brunswick, Dr. Ed Schollenberg, says he was not contacted by anyone in Alberta with such a request.

If asked, Schollenberg said he would express reservations about Hanley being allowed to practise medicine again.

At the time he was working in New Brunswick, a second patient came forward with similar allegations to Wiseman’s that were never acted upon because Hanley was stripped of his licences due to the previous case.

“In terms of him receiving a future licence, I think the critical thing is to not mischaracterize what already happened,” Schollenberg said.

“To say what occurred was a lapse in judgment, I couldn’t buy that.

“There is no doubt it was planned and predatory, and he took the same manipulative approach in the second case.”