Article: GP is accused of giving OAP pills for suicide

A DOCTOR has been accused of prescribing tablets to an 87-year- old patient to enable her to take her own life.

Dr Iain Kerr, of Williamwood Medical Centre in Clarkston, East Renfrewshire, appeared before a General Medical Council hearing.

He is accused of giving the woman - who it was said was afraid of becoming a burden on her family - sleeping pills against official guidance.

The woman later died in 2005 of an overdose from different drugs.

A further five cases of inappropriately prescribing patients the same sleeping tablets, which official guidance say should be used only to treat "severe and intractable insomnia", were also brought before the hearing.

The GMC panel was told a poem ...

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