Vijay Harypursat breached NZ Medical Council conditions. Photo / Northern Advocate
Vijay Harypursat breached NZ Medical Council conditions. Photo / Northern Advocate
A Whangarei doctor breached New Zealand Medical Council practising conditions four weeks after admitting a professional misconduct charge.
Vijay Harypursat appeared before a Health Practitioners' Disciplinary Tribunal on July 7 and admitted professional misconduct, related to text messages he had sent a female patient.
Dr Harypursat was allowed to continue practising before and after the tribunal hearing.
However, the New Zealand Medical Council had imposed conditions which included that he must have a chaperone present when seeing female patients, and that he maintain a list of those consultations.
On August 3 Dr Harypursat saw a female patient without a chaperone at the White Cross Medical Centre.
He has admitted the breach and apologised through White Cross.
The August 3 complainant did not recall Dr Harypursat identifying himself during the consultation, but she confirmed it was him when staff asked who she had seen.
"I wasn't unhappy with the care ... Dr Vijay was professional but I was concerned he wasn't following guidelines put in place and worried he might be seeing other female patients alone without White Cross knowing," she said.
In a deliberation following the July 7 hearing, the tribunal this week announced it had suspended Dr Harypursat from practising for nine months and ordered him to undertake a sexual misconduct assessment.
The tribunal told the Northern Advocate yesterday it was unaware of the August 3 breach.
It is unclear whether the NZ Medical Council knew - a spokesman declined to comment - and White Cross chief executive Dr Alistair Sullivan refused to say whether the clinic had reported the breach to the council.
Vijay Harypursat has admitted breaching NZ Medical Council conditions while working at White Cross. Photo / Northern Advocate
The patient works for NZME - the company which publishes the Northern Advocate - and was aware of Dr Harypursat's tribunal appearance through media coverage. She hoped that her complaint would be relayed to the Medical Council.
"It shouldn't be the patient's responsibility to further the complaint, when they are the ones that have breached the condition."
At the July 7 hearing Dr Harypursat admitted texting messages of a personal, intimate or romantic nature to a 22-year-old female patient with mental health issues over a six-week period in April and May 2013.
He texted: "You deserve to have some handsome young gentleman come along and sweep you off your feet. I just wish that that young handsome gentleman was me."
In another text, he said: "I know that there isn't a snowflakes chance in hell of me ever having some sort of physical relationship with u."
In 2012 he sent similar texts to a 15-year-old patient and the complaint was dealt with by the PHO he then worked for.
Dr Harypursat did not work for White Cross when the 2012 and 2013 incidents occurred.
