The Arkansas State Medical Board reprimanded a former Berryville obstetrician Thursday after she admitted secretly tying the fallopian tubes of a patient with learning difficulties while performing a Caesarean section last year.
The reprimand goes on Dr. Shirolyn Ruth Moffett’s permanent record but does not prevent her from practicing medicine in Arkansas.
Moffett, who is now in private practice in Eureka Springs, said she performed the tubal ligation — a form of birth control in which the fallopian tubes are surgically cut or blocked to prevent pregnancy — because she feared the lining of the patient’s uterus would burst if she got pregnant again.
The vote for a reprimand split the medical board 6-5. Dissenting members favored adding a probation period, counseling and monitoring to the reprimand.
Board member Dr. Douglas Smart, who voted for the reprimand, said adding other sanctions would be “excessive.”
Moffett has resigned from her post at St. John’s Hospital in Berryville. She also has decided never to deliver babies again. She now operates a financially struggling gynecology practice in Eureka Springs.
Moffett said she’s had to put her house up for sale and move in with her mother.
“She’s paid the price,” Smart said.
The board, which regulates and licenses the state’s doctors, could have suspended or termi- nated Moffett’s medical license.
Moffett told the medical board that she delivered about 2, 000 babies and performed about 400 Caesarean sections over the course of a 12-year medical career.
She performed the operation in question at St. John’s on July 5, 2007.
The medical board released only snippets of information about the patient’s personal circumstances.
During the Caesarean section, Moffett said, she found an alarming weakness in the lining of the patient’s uterus. The weakness is usually associated with past Caesarean sections, Moffett said, but that was the patient’s first.
Moffett feared the uterus would burst if the patient got pregnant again, threatening her health.
So, after delivering the baby, Moffett performed the tubal ligation without the patient’s permission, even though the procedure was not required.
Moffett admitted that she did not tell the patient what she had done afterward and did not document the procedure in the patient’s medical records.
The doctor said she was afraid to admit what she had done for fear of the consequences.
Moffett said she knew she should have let the patient decide whether she wanted the procedure done.
“I know now that was a mistake,” an emotional Moffett said. “I had not made this kind of error my whole medical career. I was appalled.”
“Not a day goes by that I don’t relive that day,” she said.
The patient didn’t learn what happened until three weeks later, after Moffett admitted performing the procedure to a hospital administrator. St. John’s immediately restricted her from seeing patients.
Mark Dossett, Moffett’s attorney, said the hospital offered to reverse the procedure, but the patient declined.
He said the patient agreed to a settlement in December but the details were confidential. Dossett said the patient never filed a lawsuit.
The medical board pushed Moffett unsuccessfully for more detail as to why she deemed it necessary to perform the operation in secret.
Moffett denied any other motive for performing the procedure other than her concern that a future pregnancy would threaten the patient’s health.
Beck referred additional questions after the hearing to medical board attorney Bill Trice.
Trice refused after the public hearing to turn over the medical records that Beck and Britton cited. Trice said the patient’s name could not be redacted to make the documents available until Monday at the earliest.
Trice said he did not know the patient’s age and refused to search for the information in a box of medical records beside him.
In an e-mailed statement, Mike Peters, St. John’s vice president for public affairs, said the hospital made the right decision in revoking Moffett’s physician’s privileges after finding out about the tubal ligation.
The statement also said the hospital was “surprised” by the medical board’s decision.
Peters declined comment when asked by phone whether Moffett deserved more severe punishment.
“I think we’re going to let the statement speak for itself,” he said.
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