A local ophthalmologist has won the right to be able to perform retinal surgeries at Kelowna General Hospital, following a judgment from the Hospital Appeal Board.
In a decision released last December, a three-person panel of the Hospital Appeal Board ruled in favour of Dr. Malvinder Hoonjan in his bid to get surgical privileges at KGH.
While vitreo-retinal surgeries were formerly only practiced at Kamloops' Royal Inland Hospital within Interior Health, where Dr. Hoonjan had active medical staff privileges, these surgeries were transferred to KGH in 2019.
As part of this move, KGH undertook a search and selection process for the positions of two vitreo-retinal surgeons at KGH, but Dr. Hoonjan was not selected. As such, he was able to provide examinations at KGH, but he was unable to perform any procedures requiring an operating room.
Dr. Hoonjan filed an appeal of IH's decision not to grant him active medical staff privileges at KGH in December 2020, and in July 2022, he filed a civil lawsuit against IH, claiming breach of contract and breach of duty of good faith.
Ultimately, the Hospital Appeal Board ruled IH engaged in “differential treatment” of Dr. Hoonjan, and noted the health authority's conduct was “troublesome.”
“Dr. Hoonjan has experienced repeated differential adverse treatment by IH at almost every level, yet almost all of the evidence and witnesses who appeared before the panel stated that he is a very good doctor who was always available and willing to help out and had a calm and compassionate demeanour,” the panel wrote in its decision.
The panel ruled there is in fact a need for a third vitreo-retinal surgeon at KGH and there are resources available at IH and KGH to support the third surgeon. They determined Dr. Hoonjan's privileges at RIH should have been transferred to KGH during the relocation of the retinal surgical services in 2019.
As a remedy, the panel ruled that Dr. Hoonjan be granted active medical staff privileges at KGH as a third vitreo-retinal surgeon with equal access to operating room time as the other two vitreo-retinal surgeons working there.
As for Dr. Hoonjan's lawsuit he filed back in July 2022, it appears Interior Health has yet to formally respond to the suit.
