No report on ‘bad’ AIDS doc

Secretary to the Board, Dr Neil Singh said when Professor Courtenay Bartholomew, director of the Medical Research Foundation made the allegations two years ago, the Board contacted him to provide the name of the doctor involved and information about the offence.

Singh said Bartholomew indicated he had provided information many years ago. However, Singh said there was no record of that. “When you make a complaint, you have to give the doctor a chance to respond. We have been asking him who, and when the offence took place.” In an interview which was carried in yesterday’s Newsday, Bartholomew, said the centre had 15 patients who were “wrongly” treated by a doctor at a private clinic and had developed drug resistant viruses. Bartholomew alleged that the doctor was treating patients with single and double drug therapy instead of the standard triple therapy. Blood and viral load testing were not done and the doctor was prescribing medication without labels or any identifying marks.

Bartholomew spoke openly about malpractice in HIV treatment in 2004 at the launch of the Health Ministry’s HIV/AIDS Health Sector Plan. He subsequently said he had written to the Board in 1998 about a patient the doctor misdiagnosed with HIV.

Dr Rohit Doon, chief medical officer said the Ministry could have intervened if the doctor worked at a public health facility. He said the Medical Board is the regulatory body for private physicians.

Doon said, “the Board has the authority to call the doctor in to talk, if they received an official complaint.”

Asked what action the Ministry could take if the Board is not dealing with the matter, Doon said, “we could only urge the Board to address the issue.” Asked if the Ministry had raised the matter with the Board, he said, “we have not done this officially.”