A DOCTOR who worked in a psychiatric hospital in the midlands has admitted he falsely represented himself on his application form for the post.
Dr Ahmed Alastal (38), a Palestinian, was appearing before a fitness to practise committee at the Irish Medical Council which found him guilty yesterday of professional misconduct. The committee heard Dr Alastal worked at St Fintan’s Psychiatric Hospital in Portlaoise, Co Laois, as a senior house officer for three months from July 2009 to October 2009. He resigned from the position after doctors there raised concerns with the HSE about his experience.
He moved to Ireland in 2000 and was granted asylum in 2003. He became an Irish citizen in 2008. On his application form for the post, Dr Alastal stated he worked at a Gaza hospital between November 2004 and November 2006 when he was actually a student at the Centre for Education and Integration of Migrants in Dublin. He had also claimed to have worked as a senior house officer – a junior doctor – at a general practice in Castleknock when he was only an observer there.
Solicitor JP McDowell, for the medical council, highlighted the differences between the application form filled out by Dr Alastal when he registered with the council in 2008 and the form he filled when he applied for the three-year junior position at St Finbarr’s.
He had also completed a form for a separate training post with information that conflicted with that given on his medical council application, but he was not offered that position, Mr McDowell said.
Michael Purtill, for Dr Alastal, said his client admitted he had given false and misleading information and was not in the Gaza hospital when he said he was. Mr Purtill said his client’s English was not all that it might be and he did not know the difference between a senior house officer and an observer. “He is ashamed of what he did and he apologises,” Mr Purtill said.
He told committee chairman Dr John Monaghan the doctor came from a large family with eight sisters and four brothers and none of his siblings had any work in Gaza. He was at all times anxious to send money back to his family. He was married in Portlaoise and had two daughters aged three and five. Mr Purtill said the doctor had been “substantially punished already” because he could not get a job and his reputation had been damaged. He asked the committee to take into account his “desperation to relieve the plight of his family in Gaza”.
The committee decided that four of the allegations against Dr Alastal were proven and amounted to professional misconduct.
The allegation that he had not made some contribution to the research paper on urology was found not to have been proven beyond a doubt. The final allegation had been dropped.
Dr Monaghan said the committee had taken into account the serious nature of the allegations and also the admission by Dr Alastal. The committee recommended to the medical council that he be admonished as a result of his behaviour.
