Dr. Padamjit Singh Oshawa doctor barred from delivering babies

OSHAWA — An obstetrician from an Oshawa hospital is no longer permitted to deliver babies after botching two births, including one during which an infant’s skull was crushed and another where a newborn was asphyxiated.

However, Dr. Padamjit Singh will be allowed to continue performing other medical procedures, including biopsies and cyst removals, with a restricted medical licence.

The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario last month released the June 3 decision of its discipline committee, which ruled that Singh was incompetent

The Toronto Star, however, made a formal request and obtained exhibits from the College that contain chilling details of the botched deliveries.
An “agreed statement of facts’ includes a 2009 letter to the college from the hospital then-chief of staff detailing concerns about Singh’s competency. It also contains a report by Dr. Elaine Herer, deputy chief of obstetrics and gynecology at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, who reviewed Dr. Singh’s care for the College.
Based on interviews that Herer relayed in her report,other doctors at Lakeridge Health felt Singh seized up during emergency deliveries and didn’t appear to know what she was doing.
“There was a sense of panic in the room, (and) Dr. Singh froze during the emergency,” said a surgical assistant at the delivery of the newborn whose skull was fractured.
The baby needed to be delivered by an emergency Caesarean section due to loss of a fetal heart rate, but Singh failed to grasp the urgency. In fact, Singh told the attending anesthesiologist that she had time to give another patient an elective epidural, Herer said in her report.