Women having IVF treatment at a south London hospital have been told their consultant has been suspended and the unit closed.

Geeta Nargund was ordered to stop work at St George's Hospital in Tooting on Friday and told to leave the building immediately.

BBC London understands her suspension was not because of any clinical negligence, but because she was making complaints about the management.

The hospital has refused to say why she has been suspended and says the unit has been closed for financial reasons.

Quite clearly in this case the managers did not put the patients first

Professor Stuart Campbell, consultant gynaecologist

BBC London understands that Mrs Nargund had been protesting for months about the shortage of specialist staff at the Princess Diana of Wales Centre for Reproductive Medicine.

She has carried out pioneering work at the centre in natural cycle IVF, the collection of eggs from women without the use of drugs to stimulate the ovaries.

Now it is understood she has been told she must have no contact with her patients or talk to news organisations.

A former colleague who helped set up the unit four years ago, Professor Stuart Campbell, told BBC London that such a summary suspension without explanation was unfair and unprecedented.

'Patients first'

"Quite clearly in this case the managers did not put the patients first.

"But they denied the consultant the opportunity to put her patients first.

"In other words, they are saying your first obligation is to please the managers and not your patients.

Specialist staff

"I think this turns the Hippocratic oath completely on its head and the government should have an external inquiry into this case.

St George's is proposing to ensure the patients a continuity of care by transferring them to a specialist unit at King's College Hospital.

The hospital says it closed the IVF unit because of a lack of specialist staff and because it was not financially viable.