Top eye surgeon who performed an operation while smelling of drink leaving his patient with a bleeding eyeball is suspended for six months 

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An eye surgeon who performed an operation while smelling of alcohol and had to stop the procedure because he could not focus the microscope has been suspended.

Colleagues at the Spire Wirral Hospital in Merseyside said Dr Somdutt Prasad looked like he 'had been out partying until 6am' when he stopped the cataract operation, leaving his patient with a bleeding eye.

The surgeon later went to a business meeting where he startled colleagues by giggling and slumping forward, before a blood test revealed he was three times over the legal alcohol limit for driving.

Somdutt Prasad was suspended for six months after he performed a cataract operation at Spire Wirral Hospital in Merseyside after drinking alcohol, and he later turned up to a hospital meeting after drinking

Prasad, 50, was suspended for six months after a panel of the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) found he presented a 'real risk of harm to patients.' 

The panel found he had been under the influence of alcohol on 28 June 2012 after a scrub nurse said he seemed to be intoxicated.

‘She said said that if Mr Prasad had been a younger man, she might have described his demeanor that day as being as if he had partied til 6 am and then come to work,’ MPTS panel chairman Neil Sykes said.

At the time colleagues said they could smell alcohol on Prasad's breath but the doctor claimed he had only been drinking the night before. 

The doctor, who also worked at the NHS Arrowe Park Hospital, Wirral, agreed to absent himself from work a few days after the incident.

But on 18 October 2012 he went to St George’s Medical Centre, Wirral, for a business meeting before his regular out-patient clinic.

Two doctors at the meeting had to be escorted away after Prasad started to ‘talk in a bizarre manner, was giggling and slumped forward’, the tribunal heard.

Colleagues smelt alcohol and a blood test revealed he was three times the legal limit for driving.

Prasad was seen as a 'risk of harm' to his patients 

The panel found professionals at the meeting would have found Prasad's conduct 'deplorable' and said his actions undermined the profession. 

Just two weeks later the talented eye surgeon was banned from the road after he was found guilty of drink driving a second time.  

Mr Sykes said: 'The panel took the view that it was self-evident that the public expects that doctors will not work whilst under the influence of alcohol.

‘It noted that, on these two occasions, there was no evidence of actual harm to patients.

‘However, the panel considered that there was a very real risk of harm to patients.

‘In working whilst under the influence of alcohol, Mr Prasad ignored the potential harm his actions could cause to patients as well as to his colleagues, the Spire Hospital and St George’s.

‘The panel took the view that because Mr Prasad was unable to perform his duties as a surgeon at the Spire Hospital that day owing to being under the influence of alcohol, his conduct fell well below the standards expected of a medical professional.

‘His actions undermined the reputation of the profession.' 

Prasad also has two convictions for drink driving. 

The tribunal heard he had been found asleep in his car with the engine running with a three-quarter empty litre bottle of vodka in the footwell in December 2012. He had earlier been seen swigging from a bottle at the traffic lights near junction four of the M53 motorway. 

Prasad had to stop the operation at the Spire Wirral Hospital because he could not focus the microscope

Prasad also worked at Arrowe Park Hospital but has been suspended from the profession for 6 months 

Prasad was jailed for six weeks and banned from the roads for four years in December 2013 for failing to provide a breath specimen, at Wirral Magistrates’ Court.

Merseyside Police had informed the General Medical Council that the doctor had been charged with the offence and summonsed over an earlier drink-driving incident.

He was caught more than twice over the legal limit after crashing head-on into a car carrying a retired couple while on the wrong side of the road on 13 July 2012. The crash happened about two weeks after he was found working under the influence of alcohol at the hospital. 

Prasad, who was not present at the hearing, told the panel he was 'ashamed' by his actions.  

The surgeon could have been struck off, but the panel said this was felt to be a 'disproportionate response' as he was a talented ophthalmic surgeon. He will have to attend a review hearing before he is allowed back to practice.