ABSTRACT

Emma walker was involved in a series entitled Doctors in the Dock, which was about six doctors who had been struck off the Medical Register. Every one of them believed that they were victims of injustice. The series Doctors in the Dock was shown on BBC 2 in November and December 1995. The programmes had emotive titles like 'Kidneys for Sale', 'Lethal Injection', 'Unfit to Operate', and in Dr. Hickey's case, 'A Fatal Prescription', which was transmitted on 7 December 1995. The programme described in detail the story of Martin Scholes, a drug addict who consulted Dr. Hickey on 10 September 1987 when he was obviously high on the amphetamines that he regularly injected. Home Office drug inspectors looking at Dr. Hickey's prescriptions over a six-month period and found 48 cases of irregular prescribing. There are well-known guidelines to help doctors who are not used to treating them, and there's always specialist advice available'.