Surgeon 'repeatedly punched patient in the face' to fix fractured cheekbone

A surgeon has been struck off after a tribunal heard he repeatedly punched a patient in the face during treatment to correct a fractured cheekbone.

Professor Ninian Peckitt, 63, was operating on a male patient at Ipswich Hospital when he unexpectedly hit him up to 10 times "like a boxer," the medical tribunal heard.

The man, known as Patient A, was admitted to Ipswich Hospital in February 2012 after suffering serious injuries in an industrial accident, where he was treated by Peckitt.

It was when the patient underwent a second operation that Peckitt struck him as a colleague held the man's head. The patient was under anaesthetic at the time.

Nurse Erica Rapaport told the tribunal that Peckitt hit Patient A's cheek "using his closed fist from a distance of approximately six inches."

She described the punches as being "carefully aimed."

Peckitt, an honorary locum consultant in oral and maxillofacial surgery at the hospital said he had to use "considerable physical manual force" to rectify the fracture and stressed that he had done nothing wrong.

The Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service ruled Peckitt's fitness to practice had been impaired and decided to erase his name from the medical register.