Dr Peter Tomlin and Dr Peter Hawker discuss suspensions

Ministers are concerned that increasing numbers of doctors and dentists are facing long-term suspension without any resolution in their cases.

A survey by the magazine Hospital Doctor has found that at least £10m a year is being spent keeping NHS consultants suspended on full pay.

The magazine reports that the number of doctors being suspended has risen tenfold in the wake of the Bristol heart babies controversy.

It claims that NHS guidelines are being flouted by trusts, which are waiting months before they tell suspended doctors of the exact charges against them and years before resolving the cases.

Official figures show that between March 1995 and October 1998, 43 cases were reported to the NHS Executive of staff being suspended for more than six months.

The last quarterly report (October 98) indicated that, of these 43 cases, 14 were still unresolved.

Only 17% of suspensions are ever established as justified. There have been at least two suicides and seven attempted suicides by doctors under suspension, while six have had heart attacks, two of them fatal.

'Extremely concerned'

Alan Milburn: 'Extremely concerned'

Health Minister Alan Milburn said he was "extremely concerned about the inadequacies of the current system."

He said: "Precious NHS resources are being squandered while doctors are under protracted suspensions.

It is not good for patients, and it is not good for doctors, for there to be a question mark hanging over the heads of individual consultants.

"That is why I have ordered a review of the process with a view to speeding it up."

New guidelines have also been issued to NHS managers requiring them to inform the NHS Executive if a doctor has been suspended for more than six months.

The guidance was drawn up by a working party comprising representatives of the British Medical Assocation and NHS managers.

Long term suspension 'unacceptable'

Dr Peter Hawker, chairman of the British Medical Association's consultants and specialists committee, said: "There is a tendency for trusts to use a suspension as a disciplinary action in itself when it is intended to be a neutral procedure to allow investigation of the facts.

"It is unacceptable to keep doctors suspended for long periods of time and is a misuse of public money when doctors are being paid indefinitely and not able to treat patients."

Dr Hawker warned that surgeons could lose their skills if suspended from practising for a long period.

Among those doctors suspended is consultant pathologist Dr Bernard Charnley.

He has been barred from working at the Prince Charles Hospital at Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales, for the past four years while an investigation is carried out into a complaint that he inaccurately reported the results of cervical screening tests. Nothing has yet been proved.