Doctor in adopted baby scandal made ‘abuse’ error before
A DOCTOR whose mistake led to a couple being wrongly accused of abusing their baby made a strikingly similar error six years ago.
Radiologist Dr Jo Fairhurst now faces a possible inquiry after lawyers for Karrissa Cox and Richard Carter said yesterday that they will make a formal complaint about her to the General Medical Council.
Michael Turner QC said Dr Fairhurst had been an expert witness in more than 1,000 cases of alleged child abuse. He suggested her work should be reviewed in every case ‘that has led to a conviction or a child being removed from her parents’.
It was Dr Fairhurst’s misdiagnosis that triggered Ms Cox and her fiance Mr Carter’s heartbreaking ordeal: though they have been cleared of any wrongdoing, they do not expect to see their child, who has now been adopted, ever again.
The Mail on Sunday can reveal that their case has strong parallels with that of Matthew Dean and his wife Katie, from Southampton. They had their baby, Louie, taken away for a year after they were wrongly accused of abuse in 2009. The case also rested on evidence from Dr Fairhurst, who is based at University Hospital, Southampton.
The Deans’ ordeal started with a scan which found blood between Louie’s brain and skull. Dr Fairhurst also believed ‘there was a healing fracture’ of a rib, ‘suggesting nonaccidental injury’. It was only after almost a year of misery that a judge ruled that the blood on Louie’s brain was the result of an accident and the rib had never been broken at all. Dr Fairhurst had misread the X-ray.
Ms Cox and Mr Carter’s nightmare began when the couple, from Guildford, Surrey, took their six-week-old infant to hospital after noticing bleeding in the mouth.
Dr Fairhurst saw bruises and what were thought to be fractures, and the child was taken into care.
But experts later found the child suffers from a blood disorder which causes people to bruise easily. And the ‘healing fractures’ were the result of vitamin deficiency.
Dr Fairhurst said yesterday: ‘Due to patient confidentiality, I am unable to comment regarding these cases.’