Health authority sues doctor alleging contract broken

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This article was published 13/12/2023 (659 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

BRANDON — Prairie Mountain Health has launched a lawsuit against a doctor who left Shoal Lake before his four-year contract had ended.

The regional health authority is suing Dr. Kayvan Alamian Harandi for $144,000.

A member of the local health committee in the western Manitoba town says it was a big loss when Harandi left.

“Dr. Harandi is a very fine gentleman, and he had his own reasons for leaving, and I have to respect that,” Murray Solomon said.

Harandi started treating patients at the Shoal Lake-Strathclair Health Centre and Hamiota Health Centre in October 2019.

Under a return of service agreement he signed with the health authority in 2018, Harandi agreed to work as a general practitioner until the end of March 2023, but he left in September 2022, according to a statement of claim filed in Manitoba Court of King’s Bench in Brandon.

The health region had lent money to Harandi, who is originally from Tehran, so he could take a medical program for international medical graduates at the University of Manitoba.

The one-year training course provided him with a licence to practise medicine in Manitoba, the lawsuit says.

Harandi was paid every two weeks by Prairie Mountain, and in return, he agreed to repay the loan by providing medical services as a physician in Shoal Lake and Hamiota on a full-time basis for four years, court documents state.

The lawsuit says Harandi was required to repay the loan, plus interest, if he failed to live up to the agreement.

No statement of defence has yet been filed.

The Brandon Sun reached out to Harandi, who practises at the McPhillips Medical Clinic in Winnipeg, but messages weren’t returned.

Merv Starzyk, mayor of the Rural Municipality of Yellowhead, who was a patient of Harandi, said the lack of a doctor in Shoal Lake weighs heavily on residents. The community’s emergency department is closed.

“I’m worried because there is nobody else on the horizon. We did have a nurse practitioner who was super and she had a very good clientele here, but she’s on maternity leave,” the mayor said.

“Thankfully, we did get another nurse practitioner who came and is filling in, and she has been well accepted. But she is overworked.”

Harandi also saw patients at the Yellowhead Community Clinic, said Solomon.

“We really regretted seeing him go, but we had no control over that because he was employed by Prairie Mountain Health, and the decision was made between him and them,” Solomon said.

Solomon said he hoped something could have been arranged to have Harandi work off the amount he owes.

“For example, he could work one week a month in Shoal Lake. And at end of that week, do on-call in Hamiota for the weekend, and that could be credited towards his debt, and do that until such time as it was repaid. I think that would be a hell of an arrangement for us,” Solomon said.

Prairie Mountain wouldn’t comment, except to send a link on its website that shows the job opening is posted.

In recent a case, a family doctor was sued by The Pas Community Development Corp. for $100,000, which she repaid.

Dr. Andrea Wilson had agreed to work for 10 years in the northern Manitoba community, but moved to Vancouver 16 months later.

— Brandon Sun