A DENTAL nurse who claims a dentist urinated in a surgery sink just before treating a patient said she was shocked and appalled by the event.

Claire Pygott told a hearing of the General Dental Council that she could smell urine coming from the sink at the surgery in Batley.

She claims she smelt the urine seconds after seeing dentist Alan Hutchinson "tucking something" into his trousers before seeing the patient in March of last year.

Mr Hutchinson, 51, is accused of urinating in the sink and other unhygienic practices including probing his ears and cleaning his fingernails with sterilised tools and refusing to routinely wear gloves.

The father of three denies all the charges except that of not routinely wearing gloves.

Ms Pygott, who had worked with Mr Hutchinson for the past 16 years, agreed that she was disgusted after claiming to have witnessed the dentist using the sink as a toilet.

But she told the hearing, in response to questions from Simon Cridland, defending, that she was too embarrassed to raise the matter with her employer.

She said: "How do you tell your employer that you've just seen him urinate in the sink?

"It was a very delicate matter. I was too embarrassed to have to say I have just witnessed you urinating in the sink."

Pressed by Mr Cridland on why she had not raised the issue, she added: "Because he is a very intimidating and manipulative man. I didn't think I could bring it up in front of him without being sacked."

Earlier, the General Dental Council heard from a woman called Patient A to protect her anonymity.

She said that she had asked Mr Hutchinson to wear surgical gloves before the extraction but he had refused.

She also said that the dentist had treated her pain as a "big joke" when she returned to complain of a complication.

The allegations came to light after a complaint about his use of gloves and washing of hands was made by the woman.

Patient A told the hearing that she would often visit the surgery at the same time as her children and noticed that Mr Hutchinson would move to different members of her family without washing his hands.

She then said that during the wisdom tooth operation, which took place in 1999, Mr Hutchinson had carried out the procedure without gloves despite her pointing it out.

She said: "It was a surgical removal and there was blood in the surrounding area and he had bare hands in my mouth."

She added that the dentist continually referred to his certificates on the wall and insisted that nobody had ever complained.

The hearing continues.