Australia’s peak body representing obstetricians and gynaecologists said it was subpoenaed for information about Emil Shawky Gayed 18 years ago. But the disgraced doctor was not barred from practising until 2016.
Four public hospitals in NSW are the subject of an independent inquiry ordered by the health department following revelations that Gayed unnecessarily operated on women who could have been treated with painkillers and bed-rest, and needlessly removed some women’s reproductive organs. One woman died.
Dr John Tait, the chair of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists’ continuing professional development committee, said it was “not uncommon” for court authorities to request information relating to a college member.
“In the case of Dr Gayed, we have record that a subpoena was received,” Tait told Guardian Australia. “However given the huge time lapse we have no further details beyond the actioning of the request.”
The supoena was issued in 2000.
“We are not aware of any further information relating to Gayed,” Tait said.
Since Guardian Australia exposed Gayed, dozens of other women have come forward alleging they were mutilated and left with infections following treatment by him. Many have said their complaints were dismissed or ignored, or that they did not know where to go to voice concerns. Other doctors and nurses were also aware of problems around Gayed.
Tait said the college would work to change the culture within the profession.
“Any woman, or patient for that matter, should never feel like their concerns are not
valid or heard,” Tait said. “As a college, this is not the kind of behaviour we promote and it is not the kind of care we support. I am saddened that this has been experience for women under Gayed’s care and the college will continue to do what it can to address the wider culture change that needs to happen in the medical profession.”
As of Monday afternoon 45 women had made complaints to the Manning Rural Referral hospital in Taree, where Gayed worked before resigning in 2016 and being banned from practising for three years earlier in June. Tait described their stories as “extremely distressing”. The college would do what it could to support the independent inquiry being led by barrister Gail Furness, a respected investigator who questioned Cardinal George Pell in Rome for the federal government’s child sexual abuse royal commission.
Tait also urged doctors to report colleagues who witnessed poor practise.
“I cannot stress enough how important it is for clinicians to speak up ... There are mandatory reporting responsibilities under national law to try and minimise the potential danger to the patients we care for,” he said.
Meanwhile, women are continuing to come forward with harrowing stories of alleged harm by Gayed. A woman who only wanted to be identified as Nicole told Guardian Australia that Gayed performed a laparoscopy procedure on her in 2007, a low-risk, quick and minimally invasive procedure that is used to examine internal organs and which requires only small incisions.
She said she woke up after the procedure, performed at the Manning hospital in Taree, in “the most excruciating pain I have ever been in”.
“The nurses couldn’t explain what had happened to me because no one could read his handwriting on my notes,” Nicole said. “They said I would have to wait for Dr Gayed. I begged them to call my husband, because by now it was 7pm and I was supposed to be in for half a day. I thought Dr Gayed must have found cancer or something terrible.”
Her husband arrived, and he asked nurses to give his wife pain relief. They offered her panadol.
“My husband is very placid, but when the nurses said that he said ‘You’re going to fucking give her the strongest pain medication you have’.”
The nurses were confused that she was in so much pain, because Nicole had only had minor surgery. That was when they discovered she had been cut open by Gayed from hip-to-hip.
“I got proper pain relief after that,” she said. “They examined me and were mesmerised, none of them knew why [he had done this] – they had never seen this kind of surgery before.”
When Gayed eventually visited Nicole she says he told her that when he attempted to perform the laparoscopy he found she had so much endometriosis in her uterus he could not see her organs properly. Endometriosis is a painful disorder where tissue similar to the lining of the uterus grows outside it.
“He said I was so riddled with it that he made a decision to cut me open,” she said. “He said ‘I could have pulled you out of anaesthetic or run it by your husband but I knew how badly you wanted children’.”
Nicole was not able to conceive after the surgery and said she and her husband have given up on having children.
The surgery left her with an infection and on an IV drip full of antibiotics, she says.
She still has nerve damage from the surgery and said she has lost feeling in her stomach. When she returned to Gayed’s private clinic a few years later to tell him about the nerve damage, she also pressed him for answers. She says Gayed changed his story.
“He said when he put the camera in me and started the surgery that he thought he cut my bowel, so he said it was a life or death situation and so he had to make the decision on the table to cut me open. He said it turned out he didn’t cut my bowel after all, but he had to open me up just to check.”
“I can’t believe every time he’s done this that, what, no other doctor in with him questioned him? How?”
Gayed has not returned Guardian Australia’s calls.
