The president of the High Court has warned the Department of Health to urgently address "clear defects" in the processes used for recruiting junior hospital doctors.

Mr Justice Peter Kelly made the call after ordering the striking off of the medical register a Pakistani doctor who was found to have forged three "glowing" references from consultants in hospitals in Mullingar and Tallaght where he had worked.

The judge said the department "must get a grip" on this pattern of defects, which has implications for patient safety, "sooner rather than later".

Separately, he struck off a Romanian doctor recruited by the Rotunda Hospital in Dublin as an anaesthetic registrar in late 2015 on foot of her 2002 qualification for anaesthesia in Romania.

Following an adverse outcome for a patient at the Rotunda, anaesthetic consultants became concerned and they administered a competency test to the doctor, normally applied to first year trainee students in anaesthesia after their first 12 weeks. Mr Justice Kelly noted the doctor failed this test "spectacularly".

These were not the first such cases before the court to expose defects in recruitment processes and he had previously drawn attention to those defects, he said.

The Department of Health must have a concern about the integrity of the recruitment process because it is "simply not fair" that patients going into hospitals cannot repose confidence in doctors, he said.

There is "something seriously wrong" if references are not validated, he said.

If a hospital is going to use any doctor, they must verify their competency and references, he said.

The first case before the judge concerned Dr Syed Basit Ahmed, a doctor from Pakistan with an address at College Hill, Mullingar.

He had worked in hospitals in Mullingar and Tallaght and the Medical Council sought to have him struck off after he was found guilty of professional misconduct following an inquiry of the council's Fitness to Practise Committee (FTPC) over forging three references in his favour in the names of three different consultants, one at Mullingar, and two at Tallaght.

Dr Ahmed, who denied forgery, had not attended the inquiry after his request for a private hearing was refused.

The forgeries came to light after Dr Ahmed applied to Letterkenny hospital for a position in 2017 and an "eagle-eyed" consultant there became suspicious about the terms of the references provided, the judge noted.

The second case concerned Dr Eunicia Ursu, of Timisoara, Timis, Romania, who was also found guilty of professional misconduct following a separate FTPC inquiry held arising from complaints made in July 2016 by three consultants anaesthetists at the Rotunda.

She did not attend the inquiry and is believed to be back in Romania. The FTPC also found she was guilty of poor professional performance while she was employed as a registrar in anaesthetics at the Rotunda in 2016.

Irish Independent