Obstetrician Rebuked for Negligence, False Records

An obstetrician accused last year of botching the deliveries of two infants did not mishandle the births, although she later falsified medical records in one of the cases, the state’s licensing body has ruled.

Dr. Farhat Khan has been placed on five years’ probation by the Medical Board of California, which also found she was negligent in removing the wrong ovary from a woman, and in prematurely performing a risky test on another patient without justification.

The board officially revoked her license, but the revocation was suspended and she may continue to practice under various conditions. One of these requires her to complete a course in ethics.

“With so many charges, I’m not surprised they found something,” said Henry Fenton, Khan’s attorney, who last year had accused the medical board of overzealousness. “We’re happy she was put on probation [and can stay in practice] because I think she’s a good doctor.”

The board’s action ends a case that originally attracted media attention when a state investigator and a patient’s attorney accused Khan of leaving a Santa Ana hospital to have her hair done while the patient and fetus were in distress.

The baby, Albert Sanchez, born deaf, blind and brain-damaged, will require institutionalization for the rest of his life.

“It was not established by any credible evidence that [Khan] . . . left the hospital,” according to the decision written by Administrative Law Judge William F. Byrnes and adopted by the medical board.

In addition, he said, although Khan’s documentation of the case is “completely inadequate . . . it must be inferred she took appropriate actions.”

The judge found, however, that Khan was negligent and dishonest when she later revised the patient’s medical history, falsely stating that her patient came to her office only once for her pregnancy test and then missed subsequent appointments.

During one appointment, the woman was found to have slight hypertension. Khan was “negligent in failing to do appropriate follow-up at that time,” Byrnes wrote.

In a second case, in which a baby nearly suffocated during birth and later died, the judge rejected allegations that Khan had failed to respond in a timely manner to the fetus’ distress.

The judge also threw out allegations that Khan had failed to recognize and repair another patient’s vaginal tear.

Byrnes concluded that Khan had removed one woman’s healthy left ovary instead of her diseased right one, and performed surgery on another woman’s ovary without establishing a clear diagnosis or explaining the patient’s options to her.

Byrnes said Khan also performed early amniocentesis--a risky diagnostic procedure in which fluid is extracted from the fetal sac--on a woman without indicating any medical need for it, and without providing appropriate genetic counseling.

In general, Byrnes said, Khan did not take enough care to document her actions. “It is evident from the voluminous exhibits . . . that [Khan] has been extremely deficient as a record-maker,” he said.

M. Gayle Askren, the deputy attorney general who handled the case for the medical board, said that the state’s charges were based partly on information obtained from malpractice lawsuits against Khan.

“In those cases, we have two choices,” he said, “to act or not to act. We can’t ignore [the information].”

He declined to comment further on the judge’s decision.