Doctor who pretended to examine Peterborough City Hospital patients struck off
Niloofar Monibi was found to have committed “serious misconduct” by a Medical Practitioners Tribunal, which described her as being “inconsistent and manipulative and not credible”.
The former doctor worked in the city hospital, which is run by the North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust, between August 2016 and December 2017 as a Foundation Year 1 doctor.
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Hide AdThe tribunal concluded that twice she had pretended to examine patients before filling out their medical records - on November 3, 2017 and on November 6, 2017. It was revealed she had copied out information from earlier registrars’ examinations.
On the first occasion she was caught out because the anxious patient told a nurse they were worried as they had not been examined.
A senior consultant who was informed of this went and checked the patient himself and discovered their chest and abdomen had not been examined.
He also discovered the patient had a crepitation (crackling noise) in the lung which had not been noted.
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Hide AdWith the second patient Ms Monibi was witnessed first-hand not to have carried out an examination by a different consultant, again relying on previous information from a registrar.
When questioned later on she pretended to have carried out both examinations before later back-tracking after being confronted with the evidence against her.
Ms Monibi argued that she had not examined the abdomen of the first patient as they said it was not painful and because she was under time pressure.
She told the tribunal she had “genuinely understood there to be no change in the general condition of the patients”, which is why she relief on the registrar’s previous findings.
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Hide AdShe added that she was “sincerely remorseful” and wanted to “sincerely apologise” for her actions
Ms Monibi also told the tribunal that after the events in November 2017 she was only permitted to work in an observatory capacity, until the following month when she was suspended.
In April 2018 she left the UK and moved back to Iran.
The tribunal ruled that Ms Monibi’s dishonesty was “repeated” and rejected much of her testimony. It said she had “failed to demonstrate” to it that she had “properly reflected upon her actions”.
It stated in its written conclusion: “The tribunal determined that Dr Monibi’s dishonest conduct fell so far short of the standards of conduct reasonably to be expected of a doctor as to amount to misconduct which was serious.”
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Hide AdIt added: “The tribunal concluded that erasing Dr Monibi’s name from the medical register would be the only proportionate sanction to impose in order to protect the public, maintain public confidence in the medical profession and declare and uphold the proper standards of conduct and behaviour.”
Dr Kanchan Rege, medical director for the North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust, said: “When we became aware of the situation with Dr Monibi the trust restricted her clinical practice to preserve patient safety, which must remain paramount at all times.
“Whist we are saddened by these circumstances, as Dr Monibi worked very hard during her training, the trust agrees that this is the right decision and we wish her well for the future.”