Author:
Publication: The Telegraph
Date: July 2, 2009
URL: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/5718982/Muslim-NHS-dentist-tried-to-force-patients-to-wear-traditional-Islamic-dress.html
A Muslim NHS dentist faces being struck off
after a tribunal ruled he tried to force patients to wear traditional Islamic
dress before treating them.
Whose brother Hassan used to be spokesman
for the banned radical Muslim group Al Muhajiroun, ordered female patients
to wear headscarves and forced men to take off gold jewellery before allowing
them into the dentists' chair.
He even kept a box full of hijabs at his practice
so he could lend them to women before checking their teeth.
Butt enforced his religious dress code despite
previously being warned by the General Dental Council for the same offence.
The GDC has ruled Butt imposed a general dress
code at his practice, the Unsworth Smile Clinic in Bury, Lancashire, for more
than two years from April 2005.
Butt was also found to have confrontations
with two patients known as Ms B and Mr C and their families during that period.
The panel will now decide what action to take.
"Your evidence was that you regard yourself
as a Muslim first and a dentist second and it is clear you were using your
position as a dentist to seek to influence patients as to non-clinical issues,"
committee chairwoman Gill Brown told the dentist.
"You have explained you had a moral and
religious obligation to persuade other Muslims to comply with Islamic requirements.
"The committee is satisfied from all
the evidence that your attitude went beyond merely seeking to persuade, request
or advise Muslim patients and that you sought to impose the dress code upon
them."
Butt posted a sign on his waiting room wall
telling Muslim patients to adhere to his strict code.
NHS managers visited the surgery in April
2005 following complaints from patients and ordered him to abandon the policy
or face a formal misconduct hearing.
He removed the sign but persisted with the
dress code - getting staff to take Muslim patients into a consultation room
and tell them they had to wear the right clothes.
Butg phoned the police when Ms B refused to
leave his clinic without a complaint form following a treatment session.
The dentist, from Manchester, told her he
did not want to see her again after she brought in her son for emergency work.
During treatment Butt asked the mother if
her son prayed and when she said "yes" he gave the boy composite
fillings rather than silver ones. Using the precious metal for fillings is
frowned upon in Islam.
Mr C made a complaint about Butt after bringing
his family to register for NHS treatment at the clinic in June 2007.
The dentist asked the man to tell his wife
to wear a headscarf or he would not offer the family any treatment.
Mr C then asked for a copy of the surgery
admissions policy to be sent to him - which never happened - then made an
official complaint.