Family GP beat himself up to frame patient he wanted taken off the books

'He walked towards the door, threw himself against [it] and put his fist on his chest and said "stop hitting me”.'

A GP who beat himself up in a bid to frame a patient for assault because he wanted him off the surgery’s books has been suspended for a year.

Dr Gurkirit Kalkat, 58, invited the man in for an appointment at Thames View Medical Centre in Dagenham, Essex, in February 2020.

But instead of examining him, he threw himself against the door and hit himself in the chest screaming: ‘Stop hitting me, ow! You’re attacking me!’ before pressing the panic button.

The bewildered patient, who had done nothing but look on from his chair as the bizarre scene played out, was taken home in handcuffs after police were called.

Inquiries revealed the GP had wanted the patient who had drug issues him off the books at his surgery as it was due to be rebranded under a merger with another doctor’s practice.

Kalkat, from Loughton, was found guilty of serious professional misconduct and suspended from medical practice for 12 months. He had denied any wrongdoing.

The Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service heard he lied to the patient about having terminal blood cancer to encourage him to register with another GP and even paid out more than £40,000 of his own money to fund rehabilitation treatment.

During an earlier consultation the patient secretly videoed the GP as he falsely claimed he had six months to live and offered him a further £15,000 to leave the practise.

But the tribunal was told Patient A failed to register with another surgery and on February 3, 2020, he was called in for an appointment where the fake assault took place.

The patient said: ‘I went in to his office for my appointment and he gave me four weeks of prescriptions. Then he stood up and walked towards the door, threw himself against the door slightly and put his fist on his chest and said “stop hitting me”.

‘I was still sat in the chair and started to laugh a little bit because I honestly thought he was joking at first. But then he said to his receptionist “you just see him hit me didn’t you?” and she replied “yes, I did”.

‘He said to me “now you have used violence you have to leave my surgery”. I replied to him “what are you doing are you being serious or is this some sick joke?”

‘I said to Dr Kalkat “I have done nothing wrong and now I have worked out what you’re doing this is how your trying to remove me from your books, because you have been lying about dying of blood cancer and trying to bribe me with money to change surgery as you and another Dr’s surgery are joining together”.

‘The receptionist said to Dr Kalkat “you need to press the emergency button” so he walked straight past me sitting down and pressed the button. I still hadn’t moved off the seat I was on.

‘Both police officers who arrived on the scene believed me and didn’t believe what Dr Kalkat said and I was released without charge. Dr Kalkat admitted to one of the officers that he has been lying to me about having cancer in an attempt to blackmail me to leave his surgery.

‘Dr Kalkat made it look like I hit him, but he was punching himself whilst shouting that I was attacking him. I confirm that I didn’t touch Dr Kalkat, I was sat in my chair the whole time.’

Kalkat declined to attend the MPTS hearing and instead filed written submissions via a lawyer claiming it was not ‘safe’ enough to appear in person due to Patient A’s ‘volatile’ behaviour.

The receptionist who was alleged to have witnessed the incident was said to have been ‘unavailable or unable’ to make a formal statement.

Giving the panel’s ruling, MPTS chairman Mr Stephen Killen said: ‘Patient A submitted to giving oral evidence on all events, with the prospect of cross-examination.

‘On the issue of whether he had assaulted Dr Kalkat, Patient A was immovable and consistently maintained that he had not.

‘Dr Kalkat had been taking increasingly inappropriate, desperate and dishonest actions with a view to Patient A registering elsewhere.

‘It was clear that, if Dr Kalkat reported Patient A for being violent towards him, he would no longer be required to act as his GP.

‘The Tribunal noted that it had not heard directly from Dr Kalkat and it was not therefore able to test his evidence via questioning. Taking all of the available evidence into account, overall, it was more likely than not that Dr Kalkat’s report to police that Patient A had assaulted him was untrue.

‘The Tribunal considered that the preponderance of the evidence pointed to the likelihood of Dr Kalkat having engineered this incident as part of his attempts to have Patient A removed from his patient list.’

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