Tribunal rebuke for gossiping chiropractor
Breach of confidentiality that revealed a pregnancy just part of a catalogue of failings revealed at hearing
A GOSSIPING chiropractor has been found guilty of unacceptable professional conduct after he told a patient’s mother that her daughter was pregnant in a breach of patient confidentiality.
Benjamin Mathew, 40, treated the woman, who was six weeks pregnant, at Cardiff Bay Chiropractic, then went on to reveal the news to her mother, despite having no permission to do so.
The pregnant woman said she was “shocked, disgusted and angry” when she discovered that Mr Mathew had passed on the news of her pregnancy to her mother without her consent.
A disciplinary hearing was told the woman had planned to tell her mother about the pregnancy on Mother’s Day. However, when she gave her mother a card announcing the pregnancy, it was apparent that she already knew. She then told her daughter that their chiropractor had gossiped when she attended the clinic in February 2017.
The woman added: “Telling your mother you are pregnant should be a special moment and he took that away from us. Mother’s Day was ruined.”
The revelation comes as Mr Mathew was found guilty of “unacceptable professional conduct” by a regulator following a catalogue of failings.
Mr Mathew was found to have “overtreated” patients when they should have been referred for surgery as well as making false claims about the benefits of using a chiropractor, and performing unnecessary X-rays.
The Professional Conduct Committee of the General Chiropractic Council (GCC) imposed a 12-month Conditions of Practice Order which involves being regularly audited by a registered chiropractor.
The GCC report stated: “The committee found that Mr Mathew had made wide-ranging and fundamental errors in his clinical practice in relation to three patients.
“The committee was of the view that Mr Mathew’s conduct was not at the lower end of the spectrum.”
Mr Mathew also claimed at a talk that the measles vaccine caused autism and that mammography screening caused breast cancer. “The talk touched on highly emotive subjects for potentially vulnerable groups of the general public,” the report added.