Doctor at Northampton General Hospital removed from medical register for altering A&E patient's diagnosis after discharge

A doctor at Northampton General Hospital has been removed from the medical register after he altered an A&E patient’s diagnosis after they had been discharged.

Dr Muhammad Umar Farooq was the subject of a Medical Practitioners Tribunal after an incident in the hospital’s A&E department on October 27 and 28, 2021. Dr Farooq had been working as a Locum Register in A&E since September 2020.

The hearing, which was held between October 30 and November 9 this year, heard that the patient presented at A&E with chest pains and their troponin blood test results – which is the doctor’s responsibility to check before discharge - suggested they were experiencing acute coronary syndrome, which could indicate a heart attack or unstable angina. The hearing found this to be significant due to the patient’s past history of cardiac incidents.

However, Dr Farooq inputted a diagnosis of “lower respiratory tract infection” and said that the patient had left the hospital.

The hearing heard how early in the morning of October 28, Dr Farooq added a detailed entry to the patient’s medical record, which did not include the troponin test levels, a diagnosis, or that the patient had left the emergency department. A short while later, the doctor altered this entry, deleting the “lower respiratory tract infection” and adding the diagnosis of unstable angina, backdating to the evening before.

He also added that the patient had left A&E without telling nursing staff, however the hearing found that the patient had actually been discharged by Dr Farooq. The hearing concluded that the doctor added this detail “in an effort to cover his mistake”.

Initial concerns were raised shortly after the incident, after an internal investigation.

Dr Farooq gave oral evidence at the hearing and said he was unaware of how he could mark an entry as being made retrospectively, which is why he backdated his later entry. However, with no evidence to suggest that the doctor was poor at using the computer system, the hearing concluded that Dr Farooq’s amendments were “retrospective and were designed to conceal his initial diagnosis and that he had discharged the patient”. The report also concluded that the doctor’s conduct was dishonest.

Dr Farooq also said that the hospital was a “busy and chaotic working environment”.

The tribunal concluded that Dr Farooq’s actions in discharging the patient without reviewing their troponin level was “seriously below the standard expected of him” and that this amounted to serious misconduct. The same was concluded regarding the doctor’s actions of altering the patient’s records.

Dr Farooq’s behaviour was described as “deplorable”.

The report added: “Taking into account the lack of insight and remediation in this case, the tribunal considered that there remains a risk that Dr Farooq may repeat his misconduct in the future.”

However, Dr Farooq submitted that he does have insight into what he did, that he knows it is considered dishonest and that he apologised to the patient.

The tribunal concluded that due to the seriousness of the doctor’s misconduct, and to protect the public, continued registration for Dr Farooq is not appropriate. Dr Farooq has therefore been erased from the medical register. He does, however, have 28 days to appeal the decision.

Read the full MPTS report here.

Northampton General Hospital declined to comment.