Dr Francis Chu reprimanded for treating patient in private hospital
A Sydney liver surgeon has been rebuked after an elderly man paid a steep price for urgent cancer surgery at a private hospital – when he was eligible to have it done for free through the public system.
St George Shire Standard
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An acclaimed liver surgeon has been reprimanded after he completed expensive private medical treatment on an elderly man without informing him he could have the surgery for free through the public hospital system.
Experienced surgeon Dr Francis Chu was prosecuted by the Health Care Complaints Commission after he told a 72-year-old retired male pensioner he needed urgent surgery for his liver cancer and would not be able to have it completed in a public hospital fast enough.
The man’s daughter had to draw money from her super to help pay the significant private costs before they discovered the man was eligible to have the surgery for free within 30 days under public hospital policy.
“The Committee found that the patient was classified as the highest priority so the relevant public hospital policy required his surgery to take place within 30 days,” the HCCC stated.
“It was likely that the patient could have had his surgery at the public hospital in an appropriate time frame.”
Dr Chu conceded he failed to record sufficient notes throughout his consultation with the patient but did not admit to other aspects of the complaint.
There was no complaint about Dr Chu’s management of the surgery itself.
“Even if there were delays in the public hospital, Dr Chu had the capacity to manage his lists and advocate for his patient, either by seeking an additional surgical list or potentially transferring care to another surgeon, but he did neither,” the HCCC stated.
“Dr Chu’s failure to provide adequate information about the possibility of the surgery being performed at the public hospital and his failure to obtain informed financial consent prior to performing the surgery at the private hospital amount to unsatisfactory professional conduct.”
Dr Chu will now have to submit a regular log to encourage him to reflect more carefully on the suitability of treating uninsured patients in the private system as a condition of his registration.
“Given Dr Chu facilitated an elderly uninsured pensioner to have expensive private treatment when similar clinical care was available to him at no cost in the public hospital, the committee has imposed a formal reprimand to alert other members of the profession that such conduct is not acceptable,” the Medical Professional Standards Committee stated.
Dr Chu has more than 10 years’ experience as a hepatobilliary and general surgeon in Sydney’s south with a special interest in managing primary and metastatic liver cancer.
He is a founding member of the St George Hospital Hepatoma Clinic and a working member of the NSW Cancer Institute Hepatocellular Cancer Committee.