South Granville: Dr Ashraf Alfy Badie Sakla guilty of unethical conduct

A western Sydney doctor of 30 years has been suspended from practising for six months after he met a patient in a motel, showered her with gifts and bombarded her with text messages.

A South Granville doctor has been found guilty of engaging in professional misconduct after forming a relationship with a patient who was 20 years his junior.

GP Ashraf Alfy Badie Sakla consulted the woman at Dellwood Medical Centre, where he has practised for 30 years, and had treated her, her husband and children from 2016.

The Health Care Complaints Commission brought the complaint matter before the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal, which found Dr Sakla engaged in professional misconduct against the woman, also known as Patient A.

Under agreed facts, the woman told Dr Sakla in March 2017 that she was experiencing serious family violence but his clinical notes about her sleep patterns, weight and appetite were inadequate.

Despite the woman not wanting her husband to discover the notes, Dr Sakla was required to make sufficient notes to allow another doctor to take over her care.

Over the next five months he pursued the woman beyond the Blaxcell St clinic.

The agreed facts state he met her in a motel twice, hugged and kissed her, gave her money to buy perfume and flowers, and bombarded her with about 85 personal text messages including photos of himself, and contacted her while she was on a family holiday in Lebanon.

Dr Sakla has been a partner at the Dellwood Medical Centre since 1991. Picture: Google Maps

They were not physically intimate but the tribunal heard Dr Sakla fantasised about it.

The tribunal found that Dr Sakla, who was educated in Egypt, made inappropriate personal disclosures about his life to the woman, including that he was also in an unhappy marriage, his sister had died because of her verbally, emotionally and physically abusive husband, and that he saw her “as the light at the end of the tunnel”.

The HCCC submitted that Dr Sakla’s behaviour “not only was a violation of the doctor/patient relationship, and an abuse of the inherent power imbalance relationship, but raised the risk of harm to Patient A from her partner, who on the material available to Dr Sakla was controlling and jealous”.

The unethical relationship stopped once the woman’s husband found out and raised the original complaint.

In November and December 2017, Dr Sakla conceded to the tribunal that he crossed sexual boundaries towards the vulnerable patient and apologised for the damaging behaviour, according to court documents.

The tribunal said Dr Sakla disregarded his professional and ethical obligations when he formed a “personal relationship with a vulnerable patient, 20 years his junior, at a time when he continued to treat her family”.

References including from Dr Sakla’s 30-year colleague, Dr Peter Kenny, said his behaviour was “out of character’’ and “how insightful and remorseful Dr Sakla” was for his actions.

On July 21, the tribunal suspended Dr Sakla’s registration for six months and imposed a raft of conditions once he returns to work.

They include only working in a group clinic with at least two practitioners, not treating more than 40 patients a day and being mentored for at least 12 months.

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