MANDEL: Scarborough doctor's licence revoked after bilking OHIP of more than $125,000
· Toronto Sun
It’s the sheer audacity that’s truly astounding.
Dr. Panayiotis “Peter” Iracleous, an emergency room doctor at Scarborough Centenary Hospital, has had his licence revoked for overbilling OHIP for more than $125,000 over a three-month period and then refusing to co-operate with an investigation.
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“Dr. Iracleous took scarce health-care dollars for his personal benefit,” a disciplinary panel wrote in its recent decision. “He betrayed the trust that the Ontario public places in physicians to honestly and carefully make claims that comply with the rules.
“He diminished the reputation of the profession. His conduct was disgraceful, dishonourable and unprofessional.”
OHIP billings work on the honour system and this doctor, it seems, had no honour.
Hundreds of records analyzed, tribunal says
According to the recent decision by the Ontario Physicians and Surgeons Disciplinary Tribunal, the Ministry of Health analyzed 408 records from Scarborough Health Network relating to Iracleous’s billings for claims between May 1 and July 12, 2021. They said they found no records to support any of the claims for which he’d received $125,353.05 in ineligible OHIP payments. In 406 of the 408 patient records, there was no record of Iracleous having rendered any services to the patient.
In November 2022, according to the decision, the ministry requested repayment and the doctor promptly repaid the money. The province then notified the College of Physicians and Surgeons, which began its own investigation. The tribunal said the expert’s survey of 24 charts from the emergency department found that in 21 of them, Iracleous didn’t appear to have been involved in the patients’ care. They also said in 22 charts, he billed for service on dates the patients weren’t even there.
In 23 of the charts, the decision said, Iracleous billed codes that apply when a doctor has been called in from home. In 21 of the 23 charts, they said there was no evidence of him either being involved in the care of those patients or being on call.
According to the tribunal, the college asked the University of Toronto-trained doctor to come in for an interview in 2023. They said he refused. In January 2024, the investigator sent him the assessor’s report and invited him to provide a written response. The tribunal said he didn’t.
In October 2024, the investigator asked Iracleous to answer 23 detailed questions about the charts that had been reviewed. Again, they said he didn’t respond.
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‘Fundamental obligation’ to co-operate refused
The tribunal found it serious that Iracleous refused his “fundamental obligation” to co-operate with the investigation.
The only mitigating factor, the panel said, was that he repaid the money and pleaded no contest: The doctor didn’t admit the allegations, but accepted that the uncontested facts would be accepted for the purposes of his disciplinary hearing.
The tribunal noted that intentionally overbilling OHIP has led to the licence revocation of many Ontario doctors — the most recent example being late last year, when the tribunal stripped a Pelham doctor of his licence for taking home “hundreds of thousands of dollars” for services he didn’t perform.
“The honour-based OHIP billing system is founded on public trust in the honesty and integrity of physicians. Revocation in cases like this is important to demonstrate to the public that the college requires each of its registrants to uphold that trust,” the ruling concluded.
So that’s one less doctor, when we can ill afford to lose any, thanks to what seems to be greed.
And it’s too bad — he had stellar reviews online.