Transcript: Dr Hambleton, Doorstop, Parliament House

And we know that some employers do want further information but that information can only be supplied with permission of the patient. And so the patient's confidentiality is sacrosanct in this country. The veracity and the high worth of medical certificates is sacrosanct as well and employers are entitled to rely on those certificates and rely on the opinion of the doctor.

If the doctor makes a certificate knowingly that misleads an employer or is false they can be subject to quite serious sanctions and they can actually be subject to both civil and criminal penalties. So they are very, very important documents we take very seriously.

QUESTION: So are you saying that the original doctor certificate that Craig Thomson's provided is watertight enough and it should hold up?

STEVE HAMBLETON: Look I would suggest that any employer can rely on a doctor's certificate. The medical practitioner stakes his reputation on the document that he supplies. The AMA advises our doctors that these are legal documents and they should be able to be relied upon.

QUESTION: It's a bit rich then for non-medical people to be questioning the validity of this medical certificate isn't it? Quite offensive to the doctor.

STEVE HAMBLETON: Look we value these certificates very highly. We recognise that they're important documents and we expect that people will be able to rely on them. We recognise that making a false statement is actually quite serious and yes I would commend anyone to respect the reputation of the doctor who provided it.

QUESTION: One of the criticisms from the Opposition is that abdominal pain - it's a vague term and things like that. But is that something that a doctor would write on a doctor's certificate?

STEVE HAMBLETON:Well as I say the diagnosis is not required for a certificate. You can write a medical condition. So some sort of guide may have been put there with the permission of the patient to give the employer more information. But that's certainly not required. And when employers do require extra information we only do that with the permission of the patient.

Patients need to know that their privacy is sacrosanct.

QUESTION: As you say there's quite a lot of employer scepticism about medical certificates. We now have the Parliament - well concerns within some members of Parliament about this - involving an individual who's the centre of some controversy. Is it not understandable that there is a call for something stronger in the way of evidence of the person's medical condition?

STEVE HAMBLETON:  Well certainly I think we have to talk about the broad rather than an individual in a particular case. And all Australians are entitled to their privacy. All Australians are entitled to keep their medical conditions confidential. Certainly there are circumstances where employers might want to know more.

But if that's the case then it needs to be with permission of the patient. I think that doctor/patient relationship and that security is very important.

QUESTION: The Opposition Whip Warren Entsch suggested that he might just be constipated, is that fairly offensive to have that kind of suggestion about the vagueness of a medical certificate?

STEVE HAMBLETON: Well once again it's very difficult to talk about the particular case. It's far better to look at the issue in the broad. If there is a guide to the condition on a certificate it's put there deliberately. It's certainly not for interpretation by others. It's still a certification by a doctor that an individual is unwell and again that doctor puts his reputation on the line when he writes that certificate.

QUESTION: Are you concerned other employers might start questioning their employees’ doctor's certificates? That this could lead to this sort of thing.

STEVE HAMBLETON: Well, yes I am and I think that we're here to remind the public and remind employers of all descriptions, be they Parliament, be they private business, that doctors do take the certificates and writing the certificates very, very seriously and they put themselves at some risk if they write a certificate that's not appropriate.

So employers do need to remember that if it's a medical practitioner writing that certificate we take it very seriously. And we think that that's why it's only medical practitioners that really should be writing medical certificates so that their confidence can be maintained in that process.

QUESTION: What sort of penalties can doctors face if it's found that they've written a false medical certificate?

STEVE HAMBLETON: Well there's multiple penalties in fact. If you're behaving in an unprofessional way the Medical Board would be interested. There's certainly civil penalties. There are also criminal penalties that may ensue. So the penalties are not minor.

QUESTION: Could a doctor be struck off for instance?

STEVE HAMBLETON: Well if it happened on a repeated basis I would foresee that that could exactly be the case. Your licence can be taken away. As I say it's not a light move to deliberately mislead in a written form.

QUESTION: If a doctor's given someone a week off, a full seven, eight days, obviously that indicates that it's quite a serious matter that the patient would have had?

STEVE HAMBLETON: Well it is and when you write a certificate for an amount of time you're trying to make the best judgement call about how long it's going to be before that person's capable of going back to their place of work. Now clearly if you're a physical worker and you've had an operation it's going to take a little longer.

If you've got a medical illness, even influenza, it's a little bit hard to predict. But we know that people can spend four days in bed with influenza so we try to make our best judgement. Now sometimes the certificates need to be extended. Equally if someone recovers more quickly we can shorten the time on that certificate to get them back to work, back to be productive a bit quicker.

QUESTION: So just because someone's been discharged from hospital doesn't necessarily mean that they would be able to go back to work the next day?

STEVE HAMBLETON: Well certainly not. There are many, many conditions that people end up in hospital for and some of those take substantial recovery. And that decision about that individual would have been made in the privacy of a doctor's consultation room. And the guide that was provided would be the best judge based on the information the doctor had at hand.

QUESTION: Does the AMA - just on the dentist - does the AMA have a view on the move by the Opposition to provide some sort of retrospective protection for dentists who fail to do their paperwork on the Medicare Dental Scheme?

STEVE HAMBLETON: Look if the matter is simply paperwork we would implore the Government if they've got a program to actually use an educational approach first to make sure practitioners don't inadvertently do the wrong thing. We certainly saw this with GPs in times past with management plans and team care arrangements where the quality of the work wasn't questioned but the T wasn't crossed or the I wasn't dotted.

It's simply unfair to go after someone for a technical breach rather than a deliberate breach. And I think the Government should take an educational approach for all health providers including dentists.

Thanks very much.

 

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19 March 2012

 

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