A North-East doctor facing disciplinary charges over a string of alleged offences, including stalking a colleague, has failed to get a ban on him practising medicine lifted.

Dr Michael Donnelly, of Demesne Court, Wolsingham, County Durham, challenged a decision by the General Medical Council's interim orders committee (IOC) to suspend him from practice pending the outcome of a full disciplinary hearing set for October.

He claimed the original August 2001 order to suspend him for 18 months was excessive and disproportionate.

The IOC has since reviewed and renewed the ban.

At the High Court, in London yesterday, Lord Justice Rose dismissed his challenge.

Dr Donnelly faces disciplinary proceedings over three sets of allegations: The first relates to alleged dishonest claims made in applications for medical posts in 1998; the second concerns alleged harassment of a colleague and part of the third set relates to claims of working while suspended.

Lord Justice Rose, sitting with Mr Justice Gibbs, said that in separate criminal proceedings Dr Donnelly had pleaded guilty before Dundee Sheriff's Court last September to stalking or harassing a colleague. On October 19 last year he was given two years' probation for that offence, ordered to pay £1,000 compensation and given a five-year non-harassment order.

On May 24 this year, after a trial at Teesside Crown Court, he was convicted on three counts under the 1968 Theft Act, stemming from working in medicine while suspended.