A Hobart GP has been banned from practising medicine for at least two years after inappropriately prescribing addictive medications to patients with substance abuse histories.
The Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal cancelled Dr Kim Yong’s registration this week after finding him guilty of professional misconduct.
Dr Yong prescribed benzodiazepines and codeine-based drugs to multiple patients who had documented histories of drug and alcohol dependency, the tribunal found.
One patient had “severe alcohol dependence, polysubstance misuse, polypharmacy overdoses and reported uses of intravenous methamphetamine and opioids,” according to the decision.
Dr Yong treated that patient for nearly four and a half years.
Hobart GP struck off for prescribing addictive drugs to vulnerable patients
The tribunal also found he crossed professional boundaries by hiring a patient to renovate his home and offering to lend them money for a vehicle.
He kept “no meaningful notes recording the consultations or reasons for prescribing the medication or plans to taper off the medications,” the decision stated.
The tribunal said the incidents “were neither isolated nor aberrations”.
“They reflect an experienced medical practitioner’s continued unwillingness or incapacity to comply with professional standards,” the decision read.
This was not Dr Yong’s first disciplinary matter.
He had been cautioned three times previously, including once in 2012 for making “inappropriate comments of a sexual nature” to a patient.
In 2024, the same tribunal found him guilty of professional misconduct for hugging and kissing a patient.
Dr Yong’s registration was suspended in December 2023 while it investigated the prescribing matters and has remained suspended since.
Dr Yong, who obtained his degree in 1983 but only began practising in Australia in 2010, accepted all allegations and agreed to the sanctions.
The tribunal reprimanded him, cancelled his registration and barred him from reapplying for two years.
He was also ordered to pay 90% of the Medical Board of Australia’s legal costs.
“… Nothing short of cancellation of the respondent’s registration is appropriate,” the tribunal concluded.
Dr Yong cannot provide any health services until he successfully reapplies for registration.