BELFAST Trust's medical director has said he has "no reason to believe" that a pressurised workload led to 91 patients having to be recalled because of a doctor's errors.
Dr Tony Stevens said the patients affected - who were notified this week by hand delivered letters - had been recalled as a "precautionary measure".
The General Medical Council has been notified of the move which follows concerns raised about the work of a doctor at the A&E department at the Royal Victoria Hospital.
The locum, who had previously worked at a hospital in England, worked for the Belfast Trust for a number of weeks with the period under re-view from May 6 to June 20.
The doctor no longer works for the trust.
Dr Stevens said concerns were raised by a consultant who identified "one or two cases where we felt the care offered by one of our locum staff, one of our locum doctors, was not as complete as it should be."
After alerting hospital management, the doctor's work was reviewed in "greater detail".
It is understood the concerns were based around issues including being able to spot an abnormality on an X-ray, such as a fracture and ensuring that all relevant tests had been done and completed.
"The problem for us now is that having looked with great scrutiny at this individual's work, we are picking up on very, very small things," Dr Stevens said.
"We do not believe that we have a major problem here. This is precautionary."
Dr Stevens said the trust was "very careful" when hiring doctors, adding that this particular doctor had been hired through a locum agency.
"He's previously been working at consultant level in a hospital in England. So, we have every reason to believe that he was perfectly capable of doing this job."
Mr Stevens said newly hired doctors are monitored and mentored and "closely supervised".
The recall is the latest in a number of issues raised about the A&E department, amid concerns about breached targets, increasing workloads and staff shortages.
It comes seven months after the doctor responsible for heading up Belfast's A&E departments, Dr Russell McLaughlin, stepped down from the key health service post to continue working as an A&E consultant.
Eight months previous, there was a public outcry after a 77-year-old man died alone and unnoticed on a trolley in the department after waiting 22 hours.
A report into his death found serious failings in his care.
Dr Stevens said yesterday that he had "no reason to believe that it was workload that was the problem" be-hind this week's recall of patients.
? A trust advice line is available on 028 9063 0500.