Complaints against health workers mainly for placing public at risk of harm

Mandatory complaints are those employers and health workers are legally required to make to prevent the public being placed at risk of harm.

The majority of the 20 complaints - which was almost double those made the year before - were about risking public harm due to significantly failing to meet professional standards, the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency reports.

This includes a "serious" exit from accepted clinical care or other professional behaviour, of which a reasonable proportion of health workers would agree could potentially harm the public.

Four of these complaints related to a worker's impaired or affected practice as a result of allegedly consuming drugs or alcohol.

Three were for placing the public at risk of "substantial" public harm due to an impairment, which includes "a physical or mental impairment, disability, condition or disorder (including substance abuse or dependence) that detrimentally affects or is likely to detrimentally affect the person's capacity to practise the profession".

The remaining complaint was about alleged sexual misconduct in regards to the health worker's profession.

The scope of sexual misconduct includes having sex with, making sexual remarks to or sexually touching a patient or someone close to them (such as the parent of a child patient).

On April 4, The Canberra Times reported that the number of mandatory complaints about health professionals in the ACT rose in 2014-15 from 11 to 20, and were made against eight nurses, eight doctors and four pharmacists.

Seven health workers had their registrations suspended for misconduct as a result.

Mandatory reporting differs from voluntary complaints, which any member of the public can make for a broad range of concerns. Voluntary complaints dropped in the same year, taking the total number of complaints down from 267 to 194.

A breakdown of the types of mandatory complaints made were revealed on Tuesday after Fairfax Media asked AHPRA for more information.

They were unable to provide names, workplaces or specific issues involved to due privacy laws.

But a spokesperson said half of them were made by employers and half by health workers, which included one person notifying of their own misconduct.

Eleven of the complaints had been finalised by April, with no further action taken for one and "imposed conditions" placed on the registration of 10 workers. The remaining nine matters were still being investigated.

ACT AMA president Dr Liz Gallagher was "very concerned" by the rise in complaints, but said they were still relatively low and did not necessarily represent a rise in unethical behaviour.

"In every walk of life and profession there are people who are less ethical than others," she said.

"I don't know that doctors are getting worse, I think people are just becoming more aware about what should be reported and what shouldn't."

Health Minister Simon Corbell said the ACT Government ensures all doctors and nurses employed under ACT Health understand their professional responsibilities and expected standards and the consequences if these are broken.

"ACT Health takes its obligations under the national law very seriously and recognises the requirement under the national law to protect the public," Mr Corbell said.

He pointed to the AHPRA report that said the 2013-14 figures for mandatory complaints was "exceptionally low" compared to previous years.

While nurses made up 40 per cent of the mandatory complaints, Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation Secretary Jenny Miragaya stressed that not all complaints are substantiated and that a very small percentage of cases result in conditions or suspended registration.

"It may also just show that the system is working, particularly as the reason for AHPRA is to protect the public," she said.

On Friday, The Canberra Times reported serious questions had been raised about Canberra Hospital's handling of a cancer patient who died following a risky teeth extraction surgery that experts say should not have been attempted.

A month earlier, the paper revealed a former Canberra doctor who celebrated avoiding a suspension of her registration by taking MDMA had been barred from practice for two years.