Optometrist suspended for 12 months

Billingham-based optometrist Ross Hutcheson has been suspended from the GOC’s register for 12 months after a fitness to practise hearing.

A committee found his fitness to practise impaired by reason of misconduct in relation to failing to carry out adequate eye examinations for several patients.

A series of allegations were made against Hutcheson relating to different patients who he saw in 2018 and 2019, which included not conducting tests for binocular function, not advising a patient about age-related macular degeneration, and not carrying out a visual fields assessment.