OO cleared at GOC hearing

A Kent optometrist was cleared this week of the charge of serious professional misconduct by the GOC's disciplinary committee.

Simon Morelli was accused of prescribing near-vision spectacles when the patient had been prescribed spectacles just three months earlier; prescribing distance-vision spectacles despite failing to record any distance-vision symptoms, or why the patient would benefit from them; and of inappropriately recording the consultation.

GOC representative, Bradley Aldbuery, said: 'Inappropriate prescribing is a serious failure in itself but when it is coupled with poor record-keeping the facts amount to serious professional misconduct.'

Morelli was defended by his brother, Andrew, who rejected the charges on the basis that the records provided were inaccurate and did not indicate that the patient was suffering from glaucoma. Morelli had not been made aware that his patient had received an eye examination three months previously, he said, or that she had been supplied with spectacles. He also pointed out that the GOC's expert witness, David Hughes, had admitted that Morelli's records were 'better than the records from the patient's three previous eye examinations'.

Committee chairman David Pyle, concluded: 'The committee is not persuaded that taken at its highest this case would amount to serious professional misconduct.'