Tribunal reprimands pharmacist over professional misconduct

19 May 2015

The WA State Administrative Tribunal has found pharmacist Vu The Tran behaved in a way that constituted professional misconduct, reprimanding him and imposing conditions on his registration.

The Pharmacy Board of Australia referred the matter to the tribunal alleging Mr Tran had engaged in professional misconduct after he was convicted of 26 offences under the Poisons Regulations 1965 following an audit by the WA Department of Health.

The Board alleged that this conviction breached the Code of Professional Conduct for Pharmacists.

Mr Tran admitted the breach but argued that he:

• didn’t have a prior disciplinary history and there was no pattern of conduct
• pleaded guilty to the criminal charges and accepted full responsibility for the breaches of the regulations
• had already been fined and punished for the breaches of the regulations
• posed no future threat to patients as the offending was isolated and occurred over two-and-a-half years ago
• had introduced a number of improvements to address the systematic failure that had resulted in the criminal charges, and
• is undertaking regular external audits at the pharmacy.

The tribunal reprimanded Mr Tran, imposed conditions on his registration requiring audits of his compliance with the regulations and ordered him to undertake supervised education and training.

Mr Tran was ordered to pay the Board’s legal costs and meet the cost of complying with the conditions on his registration.

The reasons for the tribunal’s decision are available on AustLII.

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