A New South Wales chiropractor who claimed he could prevent, treat and cure cancer has been convicted of false advertising and fined $29,500 in a landmark court case.

Dr Hance Limboro was sentenced at the Downing Centre local court in Sydney on Wednesday after pleading guilty to 13 charges filed by the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency last year.

He was fined for using testimonials in his advertising, which is not permitted when advertising regulated health services, and convicted of unlawfully advertising a regulated health service.

It is the first time a chiropractor has faced court and been convicted of false advertising.

The Ahpra chief executive, Martin Fletcher, said claiming to be able to treat serious illnesses through unproven methods was both unethical and illegal.

“In her ruling, magistrate Alison Viney said that while the practitioner personally may not have loaded the advertising on to the website in question, he could not deny responsibility,” Fletcher said.

“This is an important lesson for others who are advertising regulated health services. Today’s outcome is a reminder to all of us as health consumers and patients that, if an advertisement seems too good to be true, it probably is. Make sure you ask your health practitioner what evidence they have to make these claims and, if you’re still unsure, seek a second opinion.”

A public health physician and therapeutic goods policy expert, Dr Ken Harvey, has long called for tougher penalties for chiropractors making false claims about treatments.

“We’ve been waiting for a court case that would provide definite sanctions that might deter these people ... and I think it is very important that a substantial fine has been implemented,” Harvey said.

“Hopefully now any unethical chiropractors will realise that they need to obey the national law and if they don’t there will be serious consequences. Well done to Ahpra and the chiropractic board for seeing this through.”

The chairman of the Chiropractic Board of Australia, Dr Wayne Minter, welcomed the court decision, describing it as a win for public protection and a warning to anyone advertising health services in a way that contravened national law.

“The board has been upfront with the profession that if their advertising is not compliant with the law, they will be held to account,” he said.

A member of the group Friends of Science in Medicine, Ken McLeod, has made dozens of complaints about chiropractors to Ahpra and had compiled a database of more than 700 over the past few years.

“This court case comes shamefully late in the proceedings, given the regulators have been aware of these dodgy chiros for many years and yet bugger-all has been done,” he said.

“Quackery is endemic in that profession and I believe there should be a Senate inquiry into the profession because taxpayer money is paying for these so-called medical treatments.”

Advertisements uncovered by Guardian Australia show Limboro advertising chiropractic to treat babies and promoting false claims that vaccines can give people cancer. He also advocated chiropractic to treat infertility.