A FAMILY doctor who was cautioned for misconduct is to go before medical authorities again.

Dr Nabil Naroz, who lives in Chester-le-Street, County Durham, but practises in South Shields, South Tyneside, was found guilty of serious professional misconduct last year after he failed to send a woman with cancer for urgent tests.

Now the GP is facing allegations of serious professional misconduct.

Dr Naroz, a partner at St George's Medical Centre, South Shields, is due to appear before the General Medical Council's (GMC) Professional Conduct Committee in Manchester on January 5.

He is alleged to have failed to treat a patient's condition, cancelled a number of his patients' hospital appointments and offered to perform surgery himself.

It is also alleged Dr Naroz failed to keep appropriate records of consultations.

The GMC found him guilty of serious professional misconduct in September last year following an incident in August 1997.

June Davidson, from South Tyneside, visited a locum doctor at the Trinity Medical Centre, in South Shields, who diagnosed cancer and referred her for urgent tests.

But Dr Naroz overruled the instruction and instead arranged a smear test, despite the fact she was displaying symptoms of cancer.

In January 1998, Dr Naroz referred her to see a gynaecologist, but with a letter marked "routine, not urgent".

Specialists diagnosed an aggressive form of cancer, and Mrs Davidson died in July 1998.

While the GMC accepted that the GP had not caused Mrs Davidson's death, they cautioned Dr Naroz and said his care fell seriously short of standards expected from a general practitioner.