A superintendent pharmacist who had shown a "striking lack of control" over pharmacies operated by his company has had his name removed from the register by order of the Statutory Committee.
At its meeting on May 17, the committee inquired into the case of Mr Arvind Kumar Chandubhai Patel, of 24 Ernest Road, Hornchurch, Essex, and Wavemill Ltd. The company, of which Mr Patel was superintendent pharmacist and a director and shareholder, owned three pharmacies, at 186 Hildene Avenue, Romford, and at 205 Station Lane and 132 High Street, Hornchurch.
Mr G. R. F. Hudson, of Penningtons (solicitors) appeared in order to present the facts of the case to the committee.
Mr Patel was present at the inquiry; he and Wavemill Ltd were represented by Mr D. Aaronberg, of counsel, instructed by Charles Russell (solicitors).
Information had been received that on May 1, 1998, at Havering magistrates court, Mr Patel and Wavemill Ltd had pleaded guilty to and been convicted of 12 offences; these involved illegal sales of medicines (including prescription-only medicines), inadequate labelling, and, in one case, dispensing the wrong product. Mr Patel had been fined a total of £9,300, with £1,012 costs, and the company fined £18,510 and ordered to pay £2,024 costs. The fines had been reduced, on appeal, to £4,650 and £6,960, respectively. Subsequently, the case had gone for a judicial review on the question of the level of the fines to the divisional court, which had declined to interfere.
The committee heard that on April 5, 1997, one of the Society's inspectors had visited the company's Romford pharmacy, and then each of the other two premises. It had been established that the Romford pharmacy was under the personal control of Mr Patel but the other two were each being manned by unqualified staff with Mr Patel's brother-in-law, who worked in the business but was not a pharmacist, dividing his time between the two. A number of test purchases were made and several prescriptions seized which appeared to have been dispensed from the pharmacies at 205 Station Lane and 132 High Street, Hornchurch, when no pharmacist was present.
The inspector gave evidence that she had visited the premises at 132 High Street, Hornchurch, and purchased Benylin Day & Night from an assistant. She had asked to speak to the pharmacist and was told he had gone to "the other shop" and would be back in half an hour. She had then gone to the pharmacy at 205 Station Road and bought Triludan. Again, she had been told that the pharmacist had "just left". Returning to the pharmacy later that day, the inspector had seen Mr Patel's brother-in-law handing out a dispensed prescription and inquired if he was the pharmacist. He had said "Yes".
A number of prescriptions were seized at both Hornchurch pharmacies, which had been dispensed without the supervision of a pharmacist. They included Betnovate ointment and hydrocortisone cream which did not have dispensing labels and Betnovate cream 0.1 per cent dispensed when beta-methasone 0.025 per cent had been ordered.
In an interview, Mr Patel had said that his wife, also a pharmacist, had been due to attend the Station Lane pharmacy on April 5, but had been unable to do so because of a bad back. Due to an oversight, no locum had been booked for the High Street pharmacy. He had agreed that he had known that the pharmacies should have been closed if no pharmacist was present and that a similar problem had occurred once before.
For Mr Patel, it was argued that the offences arose through negligence rather than dishonesty, that there had been negligible monetary gain and that he had already been sufficiently punished.
Giving the committee's decision, the chairman (Lord Fraser of Carmyllie, QC), said the case was a serious one and Mr Patel could have been in no doubt about its importance as he had been visited by the Society's inspector previously on a similar issue - the absence of a pharmacist - and had also had correspondence from the Society explaining what was required. The circumstances revealed what was potentially a very serious risk to the public at large.
The committee noted that the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Bingham, who had presided over the judicial review, had said that the offences had demonstrated a striking lack of control. "Very plainly, the staff should have been fully instructed as to what should be done if a pharmacist did not appear and such instructions were clearly not given," he had said. That description of the offences, as showing a striking lack of control, coincided with the committee's view. It was a crucial part of the pharmacists' role that they should demonstrate that control when entrusted with the important professional task of dispensing drugs to the public, he had said.
The misconduct was such that the committee was bound to order that Mr Patel's name be removed from the register. No further action would be taken against the company.
Mr Patel had three months in which to appeal against the committee's decision.