Doctor subject only to sanctions that are supported with evidence.

The Georgia Composite Medical Board (“the Board”) sought to fine a doctor for failing to employ adequate diagnostic, examination, treatment, and recordkeeping procedures in his treatment of one patient.  Additionally, the Board requested that the doctor pay $265.00 as reimbursement for the peer review, and attend forty hours of continuing medical education.  Finding that the doctor’s treatment failed to conform to minimal reasonable standards of acceptable and prevailing practice, the Court upheld the fine, inasmuch as it was specifically supported by the Board’s rules.  However, the found that the requested sanctions of reimbursement for peer review expenses and continuing educations were too arbitrary, as the Board presented no evidence as to the cost of the peer review or how it arrived at forty hours of continued education.