Foreign-trained doctors responsible for most misconduct cases
Foreign-trained doctors responsible for most misconduct cases
Michael SearlesSun, August 30, 2026 at 5:34 PM UTC
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Dr Tomasz Fryzlewicz, a cardiologist who was trained in Poland, received an indefinite suspension for continually failing mandatory English language tests - PAT ISAACS
Foreign-trained doctors are responsible for most misconduct cases in Britain despite being a minority, Telegraph analysis has revealed.
Medics trained abroad accounted for 55.6 per cent of cases where misconduct was proven last year, despite making up 42 per cent of doctors working in the UK.
They were most likely to be sanctioned by regulators for fraud or incompetence. Others were sanctioned for having criminal convictions and sexual misconduct.
Of the 212 doctors found guilty of misconduct by the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service in the past year, 118 were trained overseas.
These included 28 who were struck off the General Medical Council (GMC) register; 69 whose licence to practise was suspended; nine who had specific working conditions placed on them; and seven who had the restoration of their licence refused.
The most common overseas training location for those sanctioned was India (23), followed by Egypt (17).
The GMC continues to receive more fitness to practise referrals about doctors trained abroad than those in the UK, although it blames this on discrimination.
It has targets to “eliminate” disproportionate referrals against foreign-trained doctors by this year.
The analysis comes after The Telegraph revealed that the UK was twice as reliant on foreign-trained doctors as the Western average.
Despite this, they are overrepresented in misconduct cases.
In one case, Dr Mohsen Ali, who was trained in Egypt, was struck off for fraud and malpractice after charging two patients thousands of pounds for fake cancer treatments.
He told one patient that his prostate cancer could be cured with a £15,000 treatment using ozone therapy, vitamin C and garlic oil delivered by cannula. He also charged a woman who had stage four ovarian cancer £10,000-£12,000 for the bogus treatments.
Another doctor trained in Egypt, Dr Baraa Almasri, was struck off for supporting his flatmate, Marius Gustavson, known as the “eunuch maker”, who performed extreme and illegal body mutilations in their London basement.
Rather than reporting the procedures, which included amputations and castrations broadcast online to paying subscribers, Dr Almasri found it a “source of humour” and wanted to know more about how to do them.
In another case, Dr Mahdi Halim, who was trained in Sudan, was given a final warning for bullying, after a tribunal heard allegations that included innuendos about colleagues.
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He was accused of asking junior doctors intrusive questions about their sexual experiences, including whether they had orgasms, and calling British women “dirty” or “trashy”. These claims were denied and found not proven by the panel.
Dr Halim blamed a toxic work environment but apologised and undertook corrective training. He is still working in the NHS.
Meanwhile, Dr Tomasz Fryzlewicz, a cardiologist who was trained in Poland, received an indefinite suspension for continually failing mandatory English language tests.
The GMC said he lacked the required communication skills to practice safely in the UK, following instances where he sent hospital emails in broken English, such as writing about sending a “massage” instead of a “message”.
He accused regulators of being “un-humanitarian bureaucrats” and claimed that he was the victim of a political “witch-hunt”.
In 2024, 417 complaints about non-UK-trained doctors received a full GMC investigation – or 53.9 per cent of the total, up from 50.5 per cent in the previous year – although the proportion of foreign-trained doctors increased year-on-year.
Data from the GMC, which regulates doctors in the UK, found that the percentage of foreign-born doctors had reached 42 per cent. In contrast, the figure is 15 per cent in Germany, while in France it is 11 per cent.
The influx of foreign doctors to Britain, which now tops 20,000 a year, has come as British medical graduates struggle to secure training places.
Emergency legislation has been introduced so that NHS trusts are legally required to prioritise British graduates.
A recent report into medical training in the UK, co-authored by Prof Sir Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer, cited problems with the system, including the significant number of immigrants being admitted to work in the NHS.
It concluded: “Getting the right balance between domestically trained graduates, international graduates with experience in the UK and new international graduates is an important issue of policy, and the recent major changes to these ratios have contributed to some of the bottlenecks in training.”
At the same time, NHS brain drain has hit a record high, with more doctors than ever applying to leave Britain.
Some 12,255 doctors applied to the medical regulator for paperwork last year that would allow them to practise abroad.
That is up by around 20 per cent on 2024 and more than double the number of such applications made in both 2020 and 2021.
The GMC declined to comment.
Source: “AOL Breaking”
