A Melbourne doctor who injected a woman with ketamine at his home and gave her takeaway doses has to do training before being allowed near the drug again.
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Graham Barrett was found by the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal on Monday to have engaged in professional misconduct after injecting 40mg of ketamine into a patient's left shoulder on April 27, 2015.
Dr Barrett, who had worked at controversial ketamine centre Aura Medical Clinic, also gave the Adelaide-based woman three takeaway syringes.
The tribunal ordered that Dr Barrett must not possess, prescribe, dispense or administer ketamine until successfully completing one-on-one education, approved by the Medical Board of Australia.
It includes at least two hours learning about considerations to giving medical care to patients in the home, and prescribing and administering ketamine, an anaesthetic and pain reliever.
The Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency received a confidential allegation he treated the patient once in his home in 2015, the tribunal was told.
Dr Barrett charged her $360 for the consultation, $90 for the ketamine injected and another $270 for the drugs to be self-administered.
In May 2015, the medical board began to investigate Dr Barrett.
The next month, it accepted a signed undertaking from him that he would not possess, prescribe, dispense or administer ketamine until it signed off.
Dr Barrett tried to have the undertaking revoked in June and August in 2017.
But the board refused to revoke the order for various reasons including that a referral to the tribunal was pending.
In June 2016, he gave a statement that the woman had severe depression for more than two decades, had tried at least eight antidepressants and electroconvulsive therapy without relief.
He considered her a "suitable candidate for ketamine" and heard from her after he severed connections with the Aura Medical Clinic.
He also flagged that the 120mg of ketamine given in the takeaway doses "could not be harmful if taken all at once" as 450mg was a lethal dose.
Australian Associated Press
