GP banned for inappropriate relationship with vulnerable patient

08 Nov 2024

A Victorian doctor has been reprimanded and had his registration cancelled for at least six years after having an inappropriate relationship with a vulnerable patient and threatening the patient to stop them from making a complaint about his conduct.

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The Medical Board of Australia (the Board) referred Dr Faramarz Foroughi to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (the tribunal) for professional misconduct, following a notification from his former patient.

The Board alleged Dr Foroughi had engaged in a physically and emotionally intimate relationship with the patient, who had been seeing Dr Foroughi for counselling due to psychological distress and difficulties in her marriage.

When his patient indicated she planned to end the relationship and report him to the Board, Dr Foroughi made a range of threats, including to have her institutionalised, to cause her harm, to have her children taken away and to suicide.

Dr Foroughi also engaged in inappropriate billing practices, as he claimed Medicare benefits for several consultations with the patient at his practice, during which time he had engaged in physical intimacy and sexual intercourse with his patient.

The Board responded to the notification by placing a gender restriction on Dr Foroughi’s registration, which prohibited him from having contact with female patients. The Board then suspended Dr Foroughi’s registration after receiving further information from the patient, including text messages provided and reports that Dr Foroughi had asked her to lie to the Board. He has not practised since he was suspended.

On 14 June 2024, the tribunal found Dr Foroughi engaged in professional misconduct, through:

• an inappropriate personal, emotional and sexual relationship with his vulnerable patient
• engaging in inappropriate billing practices
• making threats to deter his patient from making a complaint and providing information about his conduct to the Board.

‘Dr Foroughi used his professional position to establish and continue a sexual relationship with his patient,’ the tribunal stated. ‘He initiated discussion of personal and sexual matters in consultations where not clinically required.’

‘This represented a ‘total failure’ to maintain essential professional boundaries … His conduct was very much a breach of the power imbalance between him and the patient.’

The tribunal ordered that Dr Foroughi:

• be reprimanded
• have his registration cancelled
• be disqualified from re-applying for registration for six years, and
• be prohibited from providing any health services until he is re-registered as a health practitioner.

Read the full decision.