Dental practitioner disqualified by tribunal for professional misconduct and unprofessional conduct

02 Feb 2017

A dental practitioner has been disqualified for two years and six months and ordered to pay the Dental Board of Australia’s (the Board) costs fixed at $90,000 after a tribunal found him guilty of professional misconduct and unprofessional conduct.

In late 2013, the Board received notifications regarding dental practitioner, Dr Randeep Dhillon. The investigation of the notifications raised concerns about a number of issues, including fraudulent billing of services and false entries in patient clinical records.

In April 2014, the Board received an updated criminal history for Dr Dhillon, which confirmed that he had received a spent conviction. Dr Dhillon failed to give the Board notice of the relevant charges or subsequent conviction.

On 26 September 2014, the Board referred the matters to the State Administrative Tribunal of Western Australia (the tribunal) because it reasonably believed that Dr Dhillon had behaved in a way that constitutes professional misconduct.

On 6 November 2015, the tribunal, having considered the evidence before it, made the following determinations:

• Dr Dhillon had engaged in unprofessional conduct as he had failed to give the Board notice of his criminal charges and convictions as required under the National Law.
• Dr Dhillon had engaged in professional misconduct by failing to maintain adequate clinical records of treatment for 28 patients.
• Dr Dhillon had engaged in professional misconduct when he made entries in clinical notes of treatment and dental services for a patient which had not been provided, knowingly made claims for items already paid for, and had claimed for dental work that had not been undertaken.

On 25 January 2017, the tribunal ordered that, as Dr Dhillon’s registration as a dental practitioner had lapsed on 6 January 2017, the appropriate penalty was to disqualify him from applying for registration for a period of two years and six months. Dr Dhillon was also ordered to pay the Board’s costs fixed at $90,000.

In making its determination, the tribunal stated that had Dr Dhillon’s registration not lapsed it would have cancelled his registration. However, as this was not available, it was in the public interest to impose a penalty that reflects the high standards of the professions of dentistry. Accordingly, it found that nothing short of an order disqualifying him from registration for a period would achieve that objective.

The decisions have been published on the State Administrative Tribunal website.