A DOCTOR said to have become aroused after an unnecessarily intimate examination of a teenage patient claimed he was suffering erection problems at the time.

Dr Unt Tun Maung is accused of indecently touching the 15-year-old’s breasts while supposedly holding a stethoscope to her heart, during an examination at a village surgery to find the cause of pains she was suffering as a result of a suspected urinary tract infection.

Durham Crown Court heard that the startled patient described Dr Maung as “smirking” at the time and she noticed he appeared to have an erection.

Following the examination he was said to have acted oddly as if trying to hide his erection when he returned to speak to the girl’s mother in the adjoining consulting room.

When the girl told her mother what had taken place leaving the consulting room, police were quickly notified.

Dr Maung was arrested and interviewed later that day, denying having indecently touched the patient.

But, after she gave her statement in which reference was made to the GP appearing to be aroused during the examination, Dr Maung gave a further interview in which he said he would not have had an erection as he was suffering dysfunctional problems at the time.

He claimed he had suffered these difficulties in the preceding five months, prior to the examination on September 18, 2013, but had been too embarrassed to give details previously or even to seek medical assistance to overcome the problem.

It was one of two incidents in which Dr Maung is alleged to have sexually assaulted female patients during routine examinations while serving as a GP locum, at separate surgeries in County Durham and Teesside.

The other relates to allegedly similar inappropriate behaviour by Dr Maung during examination of a 19-year-old female patient suspected of suffering respiratory viral tract infection, in July 2012.

Giving agreed evidence in the case, Peter Makepeace, prosecuting, read expert medical evidence of Dr Neil Lloyd-Jones, who said the manner of both examinations, as described by alleged victims, was "neither common or normal medical practice", and was “not clinically justified”.

Dr Maung, 43, of Chester-le-Street, who has no previous convictions, denies both counts of sexual assault, claiming he did nothing inappropriate in either examination.

The case continues tomorrow (Thursday March 5), when Dr Maung is expected to give evidence.