Submissions have been given, at the penalty hearing on Monday in Toronto, of a suspended Belleville doctor found guilty of various charges by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario.
Dr. Mile Savic didn’t appear at his disciplinary hearing in August of 2018 and was found guilty of failing to maintain the standard of practice in regards to his record keeping, breach of undertaking with respect to prescribing opioids when he had voluntarily given up that right and discreditable conduct for billing OHIP for unnecessary testing costs.
On Monday, the CPSO’s solicitor Elisabeth Widner suggested that as punishment, Savic have his licence to practice revoked, be publicly reprimanded and pay a hearing fee of $10, 370.
Widner told the committee that public protection is paramount in issuing a penalty and that the penalty should serve as a deterrent and should serve to maintain public confidence in the integrity of the profession, as well as the college’s ability to to govern the profession.
She says revocation is the only penalty that adequately addresses all of those considerations, telling the committee that Savic “has demonstrated that he is ungovernable” and “permitting him to continue to practice after a period of suspensions is inconsistent with colleges mandate of public protection”.
Widner added she feels there is little to no prospect of remediation, or rehabilitation, saying “Dr. Savic has been given many opportunities to improve. He’s done the record keeping course, but we still have issues with significantly sub-standard record keeping. He still has not managed to bring his practice up to standard and has been put on notice repeatedly about that. It shows a lack of insight, disregard for the direction”
Former Belleville doctor Mile Savic arrives for his penalty hearing, at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario in Toronto, on June 3, 2019. (Photo: David Foot / Quinte News)
The hearing was tied up at various times throughout the day with procedural issues, due to the fact that Savic’s representative Stan McDonald is not a lawyer, but just a friend who was helping him out and wasn’t familiar with the process.
He had to be kept on track by an independent legal council in the hearing room a number of times.
Savic has long-maintained his innocence and suggests that his case should be reopened, since he wasn’t able to submit various pieces of evidence at the penalty hearing.
The committee says that should have been presented at the hearing last year, if he had attended.
In response to skipping that hearing, Savic says there were a number of reasons, including a split with his previous lawyer and he says he wasn’t told he only had to pay the hearing fee if he was found guilty.
Thinking he had to pay that anyway, he cited the fact his license was already suspended in connection with another ongoing case and he hadn’t been practicing, so didn’t have the money to pay it.
Among the mitigating factors that were brought up by Savic and McDonald was the fact that Savic had cooperated with previous CPSO orders, including mandated courses in record keeping, opioid prescription and ethics.
McDonald also noted the fact that because of that ongoing suspension, Savic has not been practicing for more than nine months and has lost tens of thousands of dollars in previous renovation costs to his former office at Bridge and Sidney Streets, as well as losses he took selling off his equipment, when that office closed.
He also submitted a number of character references from patients who paint the doctor in a positive light, but Widner says those letters don’t reference any of the findings of the committee from 2018 and should be discounted because of that.
The disciplinary committee in this instance says it will have its decision “in due course”.
More information on Savic’s dealings with the College of Physicians and Surgeons can be found by clicking here.
The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario office, at 80 College Street, in Toronto. (Photo: David Foot / Quinte News)
