Tribunal reprimands and suspends practitioner, imposes conditions on registration

13 Feb 2015

Ms Ah Choo Teo - registration as a Chinese medicine practitioner suspended for three months.

The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal has reprimanded Chinese medicine practitioner Ms Ah Choo Teo and suspended her registration for three months from 19 January 2015 to 21 April 2015.

The tribunal has also imposed a condition on Ms Teo’s registration, which will take effect upon Ms Teo resuming her Chinese medicine practice and requires her practice to be subject to periodic auditing.

Following a complaint made about her by a former patient, Ms Teo was referred to the tribunal in February 2011 with concerns about her professional conduct. The referral was made by the Professional Standards Panel of the Chinese Medicine Registration Board of Victoria under the Health Profession Registration Act 2005 (Vic), which was the law in force at the time.

Ms Teo admitted to three allegations of professional misconduct relating to communicating the likely outcome and benefits of treatment, deficient patient records and failing to protect patient privacy. She also admitted to two allegations of unprofessional conduct relating to poor communication and failures in labelling and dispensing herbs properly.

The tribunal found that Ms Teo had engaged in professional misconduct and unprofessional conduct by failing to communicate properly, make adequate patient records, label and dispense herbs properly and adequately protect patient privacy. As the case relates to conduct in 2009, the tribunal made these findings under the Health Profession Registration Act 2005 (Vic).

The reasons for the Tribunal’s decision are on the AustLII website.

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