Graeme Reeves, M.D.
The Butcher of Bega
500 plus complaints and still practicing
Victims complained of being stonewalled by health authorities
and laughed at by police. What stuns his victims is not only the scope of the
malpractice but how far back it goes. Complaints against him dated back to 1990,
yet he was not deregistered until 2004.
Newspapers have become full of shocking tales of torn vaginal canals,
perforated bladders, post-birth vaginas stitched up too tightly for sex or
tampon use, of hysterectomies allegedly carried out by Reeves without the
patient's knowledge. He has been accused of sexual harassment and botching
procedures on hundreds of women, like another Dr. James Burt. To Carolyn
Dewaegeneire, moments before she was sedated to have a pre-cancerous lesion
removed from her labia minora, he whispered close to her face, "I'm going to
take your clitoris, too." Female genital mutilation, unless necessary for
medical welfare, is a crime under Section 45 of the Crimes Act in Australia.
The Health Care Complaints Commission (HCCC) has revealed it dealt with
complaints against Reeves concerning 14 patients from 1990 to 1996. Notice that
more are complaining to the newspapers than complained through official
channels. What does that say about official channels?
Gail Small said: "He was rude. The room was horrible. There were flies
everywhere. I remember thinking something was wrong but I just went ahead with
it. . . He mutilated me."
As usual, other physicians were referring patients to him as though
they were objective assessors of to whom it is safe to refer patients. One man
whose wife died after her baby was delivered by Reeves had a message for all the
nurses and doctors who protected the medic for all those years: "Hang your heads
in shame."
Had they checked before employing him in April 2002, they would have
discovered that not only had he been banned from obstetrics in 1997 but had a
file bursting with complaints, three of which involved deaths.
A damning dossier proves the Medical Board knew of serious
allegations against him.
A midwife who worked for several years with him said that
nurses often were too afraid to confront him.
Robin Moon, a midwife with 30 years' experience, spoke of the
burden she has carried for a decade. She said that when she
complained to management she was told: "Don't take this any
further." She says, "I feel like I have been a voice lost in the
wilderness and finally I can now speak." The president of the
NSW branch of the Australian Medical Association, Andrew Keegan,
said "Simply being in the same room doesn't mean you know what's
going on." Medicine tends to think patients don't know what is
going on either and doesn't have a good track record of
listening to their complaints.
This case is on-going in Australia at the time of this
writing. It doesn't appear to matter what continent you are on,
the relationship between medicine and patients is not right.
There needs to be someplace victims of practices like this can
turn to find advocates and information. There needs to be
someone interested in protecting patients more than providers.
Doctors, nurses, hospitals and other groups in medicine have
organizations that lobby for and advocate for and listen to
them. Patients don't. They need one.
References:
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,23444811-5006009,00.html
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/battle-to-prove-malice/2008/03/09/1204998283826.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap2
http://news.theage.com.au/board-told-of-butcher-of-bega-claims/20080306-1x9b.html
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/hospital-warned-board-of-butcher/2008/03/09/1204998283808.html
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10496793&pnum=0
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